midgeling: life in a shoe.

This is not going well. My blog keeps breaking. Every time I do something like approve a comment, it breaks. The only thing that seems to fix it again is to post again. So here you go.

So here. You get a photo of gum in the shower.

Posted by midgeling at 07:39 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I have been in a funk. And that is putting it mildly. Grandpa got sick and passed at the end of March, right? Well, that sort of threw me into this tailspin that I wasn't sure how to get out of. Well, he was the first person who was a major part of my life that I have lost in nearly 30 years. I know, if you really look at it, that makes me a very lucky person. But it also left me totally unprepared to deal with loss of that nature. And since the memorial wasn't until his birthday at the end of May, it seemed to make April and May a space of time where I was left oddly hollow and achy.

So I flew to CA with my brother and sister. My mom, stepdad and 2 youngest brothers drove down. I stayed with my father and his family for a few days. It was nice to see him and his side of the family. But it was also weird to see these people I hadn't seen in like 12 years. But I suppose that is another story. The service and lunch were lovely. But thinking about it makes me cry every time and i am at work now and don't want to start blubbering.

So here I am. I don't quite know what to do with myself. I am finding it hard to enjoy my life these days. I still knit, but it isn't enjoyable like it used to be. Most often, I knit to finish up things I need to do for gifts, or to keep my hands busy while I am waiting for the kids during taekwondo or other appointments. I started another project - the Pop Rock sweater for Kassie. It's irritating me. It's not the pattern or the yarn's fault. It's just me. I haven't wanted to spin or tat or weave or anything.

Blogging? Yeah. Haven't seen me do much of that lately. Photography? "I suck at it anyway, so why bother?" Kids? They are messy, demanding, spoiled, etc. But they have their moments. There have been a few times where they make everything all better. If only those moments lasted…

See? A funk. A depression. Whatever you want to call it, it sucks. It's not made any easier by my lame job or my lazy, messy children. Or my stupid, broken brain that can't figure out which way is up. My brain makes my body ache and my head feel foggy and tired. My brain makes me want to sleep far more than is normal. So I struggle with reminding myself that all things considered, I really have it pretty good. I have a job that pays fairly well and offers flexibility, though I do not enjoy it at all anymore. I have kids who are happy and healthy. My husband still has a job. We can afford food, clothing, shelter, and even some extras. We do not have any recurring monthly credit card debt. Our cars are paid off. My parents are alive and in fairly good health. Life is good.

So how long till my broken brain catches on to my good fortune?

Posted by midgeling at 11:11 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)

The kids asked me yesterday if I would make them bacon and eggs for breakfast before school. I figured I would - no problem since their dad gets them off to school on Mondays while I finish getting ready. So I made it a point to not hit the snooze on my alarm, and I started the breakfast.

Finally, the kids are dressed and start eating. I get changed and start trying to get myself together to head off to the bus. The Murg rolls over and says "I think I am sick. Can you get the kids to school?" Um, I guess I have to. It is now 7:36 and they need to leave in 10 minutes. And I am nowhere near ready for work. And the last bus to work leaves at 8:08.

So I start rushing around, trying to get the kids ready and out the door. They drag their heels, because playing with their food is more fun. Chace drips pancake syrup all over his clean socks. I notice I have pancake batter all over the front of my work shirt. Finally, at 7:56, I get the kids out the door and in the car. School starts at 8:00, and Chace's bus comes at 8:03. There is no way in hell I am going to be able to take the bus in. I get to spend $12 on parking today!

Despite telling Kassie 4 times, she forgot to grab her backpack. So I drop Lexa off at school, and pull out of the school parking lot to see Chace's bus pull away from the curb and drive down the street. We drive home, I finish grabbing all my stuff for work, Kassie gets her backpack and we all head back out the door.

I drop Kassie off at school again. I drive Chace to his school and remind him that if he doesn't do his School Skills assignments, he has no TV or computer tonight. I didn't have time to make my coffee, so I get to spend $4 on my morning coffee so I can make it through my day. I got very little sleep last night - but that is a whole other story.

And traffic sucked. Seattle road work is a nightmare. It took me just as long to drive in as it does to take the bus. And I have to skip lunch at work today so I can come home early and take the kids to taekwondo tonight. So I get to slurp down a cup-o-noodles to hold me over until tonight.

And most of this sucky crap could have been avoided if The Murg had rolled his butt over when I first was getting up to tell me "I think I am sick. Can you get the kids to school?" But NO. He had to wait until I had already started making pancakes, eggs and bacon for breakfast.

Posted by midgeling at 10:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

My grandpa passed on Sunday. He had been hospitalized for pneumonia. He went peacefully and without pain, so I am glad for that.

I'm still taking photos and knitting and stuff, but I just haven't had it in me to do much besides the basics these days. I've been spacey and weepy and sad. I hadn't been able to see him much since we moved - they are in NM, we are in WA. He was a wonderful grandpa. He was quiet, but was so funny and had a great sense of humor. If he ever raised his voice at you, you knew you had screwed up big time.

I miss him.

Posted by midgeling at 11:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

I caught a cold almost 3 weeks ago. I had it for almost 2 weeks.

Last week I got the stomach flu.

I am doing better now.

Photos will come later when I can find all the photos from the phone and 2 cameras.

*thud*

Posted by midgeling at 09:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I am blogging to you from Vancouver, WA - my mom's house. The snow has been insane. Like very insane. I have never seen this much snow dumped on us before ever. The Murg finally made it to an airplane. He left last night - Christmas Eve. He was scheduled to leave the 21st, but all the snow had Porkland crawling to a stop. Almost all the flights out of PDX were canceled. But he made it out. It would just be nice if he would call soon to let me know he made it okay...

So we have to have Christmas photos of the kids, right? They have been getting too spoiled!

Here we have Hannah Montana Angel Lexa:

And Chace got an iPod Touch from Santa just like he wanted!

And Harley is looking thrilled as always:

And Kassie is looking like a sweet little cheetah girl.

Nani has been exhausted from playing with Yoko (the dog) in the backyard. She is just plain pooped.

I hope you all have a very Merry Christmas!

Posted by midgeling at 02:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Husband will be leaving tomorrow for another week in CA for more training. His bosses like to leave everything for the last minute, so he only found out for sure yesterday that it was approved.

Today we went to Aunt Anne's for a post-Thanksgiving get together. As usual, we had a great time hanging out, talking and watching movies. I finally got to see the second Hulk movie (which I think was better than the first), Kung Fu Panda and Ironman. Ironman made me realize that I still have a thing for both Robert Downey Jr. and Jon Favreau.

In other news, thanks to BramblingBerry, I have joined CrochetMe and have been checking that out. I also checked out a preview for the Crochet Me book, and I actually really like it. Most times I prefer knitting, especially for garments, but thanks to Interweave's eye for good designs, I think this book has a lot of really nice projects.

Well, I have a possed out 5 year old in my lap and a husband whining for me to come to bed. So goodnight everyone. I can't believe I am nearly done with NaBloPoMo and I haven't missed a day yet.

Posted by midgeling at 11:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We all drove down to my mom's in Vancouver this morning and got there at about lunchtime. It was really nice to be able to spend Thanksgiving with my family for the first time in over 10 years.
The food? There was a ton of it. Turkey, Ribeye roast, turkey and beef gravy, stuffing, potatoes, sweet potatoes, rice, green beans, cranberries, pumpkin pie and custard pie. It was all delicious. And it was so nice to get to hang out with my family, then get sleepy after eating while we digested.

Even Nani wasn't immune to the turkey coma.

Posted by midgeling at 11:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

These days, I am all about the last minute blog post.

I had Kassie's parent conference today, and both her teachers told me how wonderful and sweet and smart she is. She's way ahead of schedule as far as her development and achievement goes, which isn't surprising. She also managed to yank out her tooth today. It her left front on top, and left a rather gross, bloody gaping hole.

You know how when you are knitting something and from the very beginning you think your project is coming out a bit small and tight? Like maybe your needle is too small? And you try it on a few times as you go, thinking maybe it will somehow magically loosen up after you knit a bit farther? Well, before you get 2/3 of the way through the item, just rip it out and start again with a bigger needle. Listen to your gut. Because just maybe, even though you grabbed a needle from the 3mm section of your Circular Solution holder, you might have put the wrong size in that slot earlier. Just maybe.

Posted by midgeling at 11:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yup. He's home. This looks like what I remembered from a bit over a week ago. The trip to pick him up last night did not go well. Because of freeway construction, I had to take I-90 through Mercer Island, to Seattle, and then South to the airport. This is the loooong way. And because of the State Police blocking the exit to SR518, I had to go south and take surface streets to the airport, which then make you loop all around the place before the road will finally spit you out at the terminal.

And home? Not much better. The freeway off ramp by my house that was open when I left was closed when I returned. So I had to take I-90 east and get off the freeway miles farther away. Then because I was so tired, I spaced out and missed my turn and ended up driving an extra 2 miles out of my way. I was so tired I felt like I was driving drunk. It felt awful.

But I finally got to sleep and here I am at the end of another day, just thankful that I only have one more day to go before I can have turkey. Hooray for 4 day weekends! (Well, for me at least. That guy in my bed has to work Friday. )

Posted by midgeling at 09:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Weird things are afoot here in my house. The circuit breaker keeps tripping in various areas of the house. This normally does not happen, and it's not like we are having a storm or anything that would cause surges. The internet connection has been acting up too. It keeps getting cut off, but then comes back after a while. I can't even manage to save this post, so I am having to make sure I save on the PC so I don't lost it first. What a pain.

The husband comes back tonight at like 11:30. I am already so tired. I feel like I am drunk or something because I am so sleepy. I hate this feeling!

Okay, I am out of here. Naptime is calling me before I have to run out to get him.

Posted by midgeling at 10:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I don't think I will be succumbing to the Christmas Knitting Madness again like I did last year. I did start 2 new projects this week, and if I am lucky. I will have several people to knit for. But I don't think I will be as maniacal as I was last year.

The scarf is growing, and I still wonder if I will be able to part with it next month. I just love how the red is zig zagging down the length, adn the colors are sitting so well next to each other and not looking like Technicolor cat vomit.

The mohair rectangle thingy is coming along nicely, and I learned that frogging a couple of rows of loopy mohair is much easier than regular mohair yarn for some reason. I would never have imagined that to be the case in a million years. I would have thought it would be worse with all the baby loops catching on each other. But no, it slid out quite nicely. And I only frogged once when I realized that the pattern I was trying to knit was a waste of time and effort. It actually made knitting more difficult because I had to try to keep track of knits and purls, and I was dropping stitches far too often. Garter stitch is my friend with this project.

The little brown blurb? Those will be mittens. I am hoping they don't turn out too boring looking when I am done. I am going for "classic" and not frumpy. If they turn out frumpy, I will have to knit them again in a happier color and keep the frumpy ones as backups for me. My hands are always freezing in the mornings when I am walking the girls to school.

Nani is doing well. At least she is still growing and healthy. I think I need to kill her tonight. Okay, well maybe not kill her, but she has made me VERY angry today. We were gone for about 4 hours today due to church and Costco. Within 5 minutes of letting her back in when we got home, she peed in HK's bathroom and pooped on my bedroom floor. Because she really couldn't have done that when she was outside for 4 hours, right? Or maybe she was angry with us for daring to leave her alone for a few hours and not take her with us. The mongrel has made me most unhappy with her.

And after ranting tonight for a few minutes about how I am fed up with nothing ever working right, I ordered myself a new keyboard and mouse. It sucks that it won't ship until Dec 10, but I suppose I will live until then.

Okay, it's time for me to get myself and these snotlings into bed. I hope everyone has had a great weekend.

Posted by midgeling at 09:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I got sucked into the black hole known as "Putting the 5 year old down for a much needed nap". I was out for 2 hours, and she was out for nearly 4. She had been so whiny and impossible! It was really bad.

My sister drove up yesterday to hang out. we went shopping and had lunch at Shanghai Garden in Seattle. It was a great lunch!! This morning we went to Voula's Offshore Cafe. OMG, I love the Greek Hobo!! It is a huge amount of food, so it always ends up being breakfast and lunch for a day. If you haven't tried that place and you live in/bear Seattle, you need to scoot on down there.

My new toy arrived yesterday. Well, it's not really a toy, so much as it is a gadget aimed at preventing me from getting angry at corner-cutting and maiming my husband. It's a 7 port USB hub. It's cute and fits right under the little metal archy thing on my iBeast. It has pretty lights and keeps me from having to plug and unplug stuff because the husband can't find all the cords to the old hub. I was doing that for weeks, so as a result, I now have a bad/dead front USB port on the front of the new iBeast. I was not happy.

My mouse died, and now I have this crappy old Dell mouse that randomly decides to move the cursor around and screw with your stuff you are working on. I give the husband 2 weeks after he gets home to research the perfect mouse to his heart's content before I bag it and just buy my own. I am sick of him putting things off and then having stuff getting messed up all the time when he tries to cut corners. Then fixing stuff ends up costing more in the long run than if we just did it right in the beginning, instead of ghetto rigging everything.

Can you tell this has been on my mind a lot lately?

Okay, I have to get the kids to bed now since I really don't want a struggle when getting us all out the door tomorrow for church. Nighties!

Posted by midgeling at 10:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I almost forgot. Seriously. I have to do a blog post today. I had a million "interesting" thoughts swirling around in my brain earlier. I saw lots of stuff that caught my eye today. I kept thinking "Oh I need to blog that later." And I never did, because life kept getting in the way. I was trying to get a bunch of stuff finished up for work since I am taking tomorrow off to have parent teacher conferences and hang out with my sister.

I started a new project today. It's just a basic rectangular stole using Cherry Tree Hill's Baby Loop. It's sort of a shaded blues colorway,and it's quite pretty. The binder thread actually has a purplish color to it. I am not going to bother doing anything fancy, since the loopiness would obscure almost any kind of pattern I tried. I am hoping this will end up being done in time for Christmas, and I can give it to someone as a gift. But I can't tell who on my blog in case somehow it gets back to them. Family and friends sometimes look at this thing to see photos of the kids.

So here's the yarn. The shawl isn't anything worth photographing just yet. Maybe later.

Posted by midgeling at 10:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Lunch was good. Salmon sashimi and a fresh bowl of hot rice. It helped to make up for the fact that work has been making me feel totally stupid and worthless this week. Since our computer upgrade, the new interface has slowed down my workflow so much. It went from character cell driven to drop-down clicky menu everything where I have to click to 4 different screens to find all the data that I used to look up on one screen in the old system. It feels like I have barely done a thing at all this week.

Harley dyed my cat's ears pink. She claims that he stepped in the dye first, like somehow that makes it okay. Teenagers seem to lack logical reasoning skills.

Darn it, I am just wiped out today. I need to just go to sleep. I am really struggling to put together a coherent sentence. *headdesk*

Posted by midgeling at 09:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

...back from the library and Target now.
...eating Cherry Cordial ice cream out of the container.
...really glad I took that nap this morning.
...laughing at the phone conversation Lexa is having with her dad right now.
...kicking some butt on Mob Wars right now.
...wishing the dog would calm down and go to sleep already.
...wishing the kids would calm down and go to sleep already.
...really happy that I have this Friday off.
...too full to eat that salmon sashimi after all.
...thinking I should just give in and take something for the headache already.
...trying to remember where the heck I put that tape measure.
...looking forward to perusing the library books I checked out today.
...going to reheat my green tea and head off to bed.

Posted by midgeling at 09:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I spent a stupid amount of time this morning trying to get this stupid "perfect" photo taken, because the lighting was just perfect and it really did look cool sitting up on the sideboard like that in the morning light. Well, it didn't work out the way I wanted. The photo here isn't at all what my eyes were seeing, and I am not a good enough photographer to make it come out the way my brain was seeing it.

Nothing has been working at all right these days. My brand new dishwasher? Broken. Yup. Made me want to cry, then go on a killing rampage. It's not because of a mere non-functional kitchen appliance. It is because I finally thought the Great Kitchen Curse had lifted. The old house had its many kitchen issues. Broken dishwasher, no kitchen cabinets, broken ice maker, broken stove (which was replaced after I spent more than a year without a stove cooking for SIX people), no kitchen sink, etc. Having a back injury and doing dishes day after day in the bathtub sucks more than you can even imagine.

We moved here to the new house, and I had a Nice Kitchen. Spacious (sort of), with a large range, convection oven, garbage disposal, and even an adjoining dining area! I loved it. Then my dishwasher broke over the summer. Not to big of a deal but the Murg Hubby dragged his heels on getting the old one fixed. We FINALLY got a repair guy in several months after it initially broke. He said we needed a new dishwasher since it would cost more to fix than it was worth.

So I get a beautiful, good quality dishwasher delivered - but not professionally installed. And now a week later, it doesn't work at all. I could go into the details of how I got here, but I won't, because if I do, I will get angry and be in a bad mood. And I don't want that right now. I used to love cooking and baking. I am starting to hate even having too go into the kitchen anymore. All the joy was sucked out of it for me years ago.

And to make matters just that much worse, today I discovered that my beloved espresso machine has lost the steamer function. You know what? I think the only solution left is for someone to get me a kitchen manager. This is has gotten far too stressful for me to handle anymore.

Posted by midgeling at 10:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I dropped the Murg Hubby off at the airport this morning for his week of training in CA. At the end of the week he will stop by his Grandma's in Santa Rosa for a visit before he returns on Monday. It was 8 30 and I was wide awake and needed gas. So I stopped for coffee and a scone, then went to fill up the gas tank. For the first time in what feels like years, gas was under $2.00 a gallon. I was amazed.

By the time I got home, I was tired but wired from the caffeine, so I took Nani for a walk before dragging the kids off to church. Church was great! It was really fun. The music was great, and Pastor Tracey was all fired up and really happy and enthusiastic. It was a really nice service. I really needed that.

After that, I went to Uwajimaya for some groceries. I was shocked to see that 3 bags of groceries came to $74.41. Good thing gas was lower today or we'd be low on food money by the end of the week.

I finally got all the kids in bed and the house is quiet. It is amazing. Chace is asleep in my bed, because he still isn't feeling good. He's been sick for over a week, with a low grade fever to boot, so I am thinking that I may take him to the doctor this week. He was home sick on Friday with a migraine, too. Poor baby. Well, I should be off to bed now. Good night!

Posted by midgeling at 11:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

No, that's not a photo of sushi. It's a photo of leaves at the playground. I really love fall. I was going to write a continuation of yesterday's post, but I am really just too tired to do that much thinking. I slept in today, which felt good. I really only got out of bed today at 11 am. My cold has gotten much better, but it has left me with absolutely no energy at all.

The Murg Hubby will be leaving tomorrow for the airport at about 11 am. He will be in CA next week for more training. So I will be a single mom until he comes back home next weekend. I think my sister will be coming up for a visit on Thursday, so that will be nice for me!

The kids were all clamoring for sushi tonight, so The Murg took us out to Sushi Yama for a conveyor belt sushi dinner. It was really pretty good, and reasonably priced. So I am now stuffed full and ready for bed. Goodnight!

Posted by midgeling at 10:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

for a special installation of World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King.

We hope to resume the regular posting schedule when the WoW geeks of this residence give back my computer.

In the meantime, please enjoy the following short musical number:

Posted by midgeling at 09:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Yup. Still sick. Slept most of today so far. No photo today because I just cant muster up the energy for it. I got the new dishwasher yesterday. I love it. It works great - except for the fact that the heating element doesn't work. That will be fixed soon.

Today Lexa crawled into bed with me and was cuddling. I remembered that I have been meaning to make her an appointment with the pediatric dentist to get a cavity filled. When I said that thought out loud, Lexa dove under the covers and shouted "No! No dentist! I protest!" The girl does not have the mind of an ordinary 5 year old.

Okay, I am going to do get myself some more tea and juice and crawl back in bed.

Posted by midgeling at 03:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yup. Sinuses are on fire, and I have a headache that feels like the front of my face will explode. I even have a fever, since the sinus ickiness wasn't enough.

So you know what The Hubby asked me a half hour ago? "Shouldn't you start dinner soon?"

Oh, yeah. Because that's exactly what I'd rather be doing. Please let me hang out in the kitchen. I should sneeze in his food.

(Okay, in his defense, he got paged and ended up being at work 11 hours yesterday. But still. He could at least offer to make dinner tonight.)

Posted by midgeling at 06:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Wow, today needs to come to an end. I had work, kids that needed to go to school, early dismissal, trash day, spastic dog, poop in bedroom, Jehovah's witness, forgotten Target bag, trip to Redmond, McDonald's snack, rescue computer-challenged friend, Sam's Club, Taekwondo, haul groceries, feed kids, and eat pickles.

I have a headache.

As soon as food is done for me, I am showering, then curling up in bed with my iPod and some knitting. There's so much more that needs to be done, but I honestly just don't have the energy for it today. Thank God The Murg had the foresight to buy some microwave dinners the other night. They are saving my life today.

Posted by midgeling at 07:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

It feels like my vote didn't matter, since I don't support either McCain or Obama. No matter who wins, I hope he does a good job. The smaller government positions meant more to me. I never liked Gregoire as Governor, so I was happy to hear she probably won't make another term.

Most of all, I am just glad this election season is finally coming to a close. It's been ugly, and I hope we never have another like it again in my lifetime.

On the brighter side, I took HK, her friend Jamie, Kassie and Lexa to the Mercer Island Thrift Store. It's only about a 10 minute drive from our house. HK is like the anti-preppy. So we found it funny when she actually decided to buy some Abercrombie & Fitch jeans to freak her friends out. There's no way I would ever buy her those brand new from the store, but since this is benefiting a thrift store and their charities, I felt okay about it. She got another pair of jeans (Banana Republic) and a cool hoodie, too.

I bought myself an old purse that had to be from the 50s or 60s and a long, black wool coat with a velvet lined hood. We call it my Jedi Coat. I need to replace a button, but it is COOL.

The little girls wanted to play at the park next to the store, so while we were there listening to a little mob of French boys bullying the other kids, I decided to look around at some of the art in the park that I hadn't had a chance to check out before. This piece caught my eye:

And after I snapped a few photos, I decided to get the girls home before Lexa beat the crap out of the little redhead bully French boy. She was holding a rather large rock and they were wandering toward the bushes. She totally would have wasted the kid if it came down to it, lol!

Posted by midgeling at 09:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

"We won! We won this thang."

That's what I heard as I stepped on to the #4 bus going from Harborview to downtown Seattle. The woman was so loud that I couldn't help but hear every word she said, even though my marshmallow earbuds were firmly squished into my ears.

The bus was so slow since traffic was busy, and the bus was packed tight. I was standing, holding on to the bars for dear life. (The #4 bus is not one where you want to go careening into one of the more 'unusual' passengers - especially when they are grinning mischievously at you. ) So my 15 minute bus ride that normally takes 5 minutes was filled with shouts of joy from people of color all cheering about how they won.

One man asked "Wait, they announced it already?" There were some laughs and the loud and boisterous woman who began the whole conversation told him no, but "nobody in their right mind would vote for the other guy. We won. I can feel it." There were about 8 people all laughing and celebrating how "they" won tomorrow's election.

So I started wondering - since I am neither black nor white, does that mean I lose? Or do I just not matter at all? Was this a race for race or a race for the presidency? It struck me how naive I must have been. I honestly thought it finally stopped being about race.

If Black wins or if White wins, I don't think racial tension will ease up one bit for either side of this war. And that is the saddest part of all.

Posted by midgeling at 07:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I am still having a hard time believing I have a teenager in high school going to a homecoming dance. I just don't believe it, yet here she is.

Posted by midgeling at 10:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The last 2 weeks have been bad. I haven't posted anything. I have been plurking a bit, though.

Let's see. September 16 was the Computer Conversion From Hell. I worked the following weekend both Saturday and Sunday. The weekend after that was spent battling a migraine - and losing. This week? Marginally better because the throbbing head has calmed to a tolerable thud most days.

I met someone in my yard a couple of weeks ago. He's renting my dark pink rosebush:

Poor Nani missed two weeks of her Friday Photos. It will get better. I mean, I got my Wollmeise sock club shipment!

And Lexa has been going for testing for a previously undetected heart murmur. I didn't realize until the tests started up that I would be so stressed out. We find the results out on Monday. Meanwhile, life goes on. It will get better soon. Really.

Posted by midgeling at 06:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

While reading this, please play the Benny Hill chase theme song in your head.

I have had some traumatic experiences with various school systems both as a child and as an adult. I even had a racist teacher who hit me with stuff (chalk, erasers, rulers). But this one takes the cake.

Click below to read the rest. It's long.

Continue reading "Bellevue School System - Benny Hill Edition" »

Posted by midgeling at 09:37 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)

Last night I heard splashing and whining coming from the bathroom. Harley and I were out here in the living room, so we decided to go investigate the strange noises. Harley went into the bathroom and said "OMG, why is there water all over the floor?" She looked up right as I walked in and we both saw this scene:

Chace said "But mom, she was stinky!"

This week has been sort of rough. Monday was spent trying to furiously prepare for the night's massive computer system upgrade at work. By 10pm, the old system was crashing and hanging. They thought they may have to abort go-live of the new system. I didn't get everything done that I needed to. By 12:30 am, I called it a night. We lost some statistical data. But an even bigger deal was that one of the guys forgot to do the final billing batch out of the old version. Now they are trying to figure out how to recover about a half a million dollars stuck on the old, dead server. My main backup guy on the IT team has been sort of cranky with me. I am going to chalk it up to stress.

Tuesday was just a series of minor irritations that kept coming at me all day long. I handled it.

Wednesday, I finally got the call that the middle school that my son was supposed to be going to was finally going to register my child and get him started in school. I had been trying to get him registered since JUNE. The registrar had/has issues. The next blog entry has the school details if you are interested. I had to write the ordeal to get it all out of my system. And keep in mind while if read it that Bellevue is supposed to have the number one district in the state. ORLY?

Later that night was nice. My sister and 2 of my brothers take us out to dinner. Since they had the moving truck all loaded up and were moving back to Vancouver, WA.

So Chace finally starts school on Thursday. I walk the kids to school, and Chace's bus stop is right next to the girls' school, and his bus leaves at the same time the girls start class. Pretty convenient. From there, I go straight to a meeting at work, where I walk into the tail end of another meeting that I get dragged into. It is a major sh*tstorm - fallout from the upgrade on Monday night. Wrapping up some details here makes me late for the meeting I was scheduled to be in. So after that, I run straight back to get Lex from school, go to the store for dog food, and realize that after buying shoes for the girls and the damn dog food, I have almost exactly $5 to last me until Friday next week. Lovely.

I run home to finish work, get wrapped up in that and am a couple minutes late picking Kassie up from school. I adjust my calendar to give me my reminder 5 minutes earlier. I continue working on that missing half million dollars issue for work. I keep looking at the clock wondering where Chace is. About an hour after school has let out, I really start to worry. I know he walks slow and dawdles, but he is nowhere outside. I call the school, who calls transportation, who calls the bus driver. Nobody has seen him. The school pages him. They don't hear from him. I let them know he is a high functioning autistic boy who is at the school for his first time of the school year. I am worried that he may have gotten stressed out and disoriented - it has happened before. I get in the car and start to search the neighborhood. By this time, I am in tears. The school calls me back a few minutes later to tell me that he came in the office.

I go pick him up. He had fallen asleep outside under a tree. The intercom page woke him up. I asked him why he was still at school. He said he was waiting for me to pick him up and/or he missed his bus. He didn't call me because he figured I would notice he didn't come home on the bus and I would go pick him up. I made sure he knew that if he missed his bus, he needed to go to the office and call me.

Today is Friday. It is also Talk Like A Pirate Day. I am also a year older. As a special birthday gift to me, Nani had explosive diarrhea on the living room carpet this morning. We have cream colored carpet. So far, despite hunger, I have been unable to eat breakfast.

God, I pray that the weekend goes better. I pray that Mr Midgeling realizes that making me pay for shoes, school clothes, school supplies and school lunches out of the household budget is making it so that we will not be able to afford milk next week. Lord, please give the man a clue. Amen.

Posted by midgeling at 08:57 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

I can't believe it's been 7 years already. I love you, sweet girl.

Posted by midgeling at 05:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

This is our new puppy! She doesn't have a name just yet, and we haven't brought her home yet. We are curently in Vancouver, WA at my parent's house having an end of summer vacation. My mom's birthday is on Friday and my Dad's birthday is Saturday. It will be the first time my mom will have all of her kids together on her birthday in over 10 years. It's too bad my step-bro Andy cant be here.

Anyway, the whole vacation thing is the reason why we wont be able to pick her up until Saturday afternoon. We didn't want her to have too much upheaval, moving from house to house in just one week.

Isn't she pretty? She chose us. She kept coming over and sitting on Harley's feet. Harley would pick her up, we would cuddle her and pass her around and then put her down. Then she would come right on back. She is one of 10 (!) puppies. She's probably the most mellow and quiet of the bunch. The dad is a registered German Shepard, but the mom wasn't registered because she was the runt of her litter and not considered "quality". Both parents were nice, even-tempered dogs, so I think this puppy will be a good match for us.

I have a few more photos on my Flickr account.

Posted by midgeling at 10:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Well, I got rid of the bronchitis, finally. I've been a bit sad lately. Our kitty, Baby has disappeared. He's been gone for about 3 weeks now. I have been reading about bear sightings by families on our block. In this area, vets are reporting a large increase of dog and cat deaths due to raccoon attacks. I feel sick over it. I know that he wouldn't have understood or been happy kept as an indoor cat. He was 12, but that didn't seem like near enough time for us.

But the roses are still looking pretty in my yard. Baby loved the new yard.

and if you want to have fun, head over to Plurk. It's been taken over by knitters of the world and become a whole lot of fun, lol!

Posted by midgeling at 09:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Last night at 10 I decided I needed to just suck it up and go to the Urgent Care. My breathing was getting worse and I hurt all over from coughing. It seems that I have bronchitis that severely aggrivated my asthma. I wasn't responding to my regular meds. After 10 minutes on a nebulizer, I felt slightly better. I filled my prescription for prednisone and antibiotic-mycin.

I got home. I ate a banana since the doc was worried about my potassium levels because of my frequent albuterol use. I ate German chocolate cake. I went to bed. I woke up. I still felt like poo.

So today I managed to get through one more work day - barely. I needed to remind myself that life doesn't totally suck, so I decided to go look at my flowers in the yard. The hydrangeas looked especially lovely.

And up close we see:

Even the simple little daisies were looking rather beautiful.

Mr Midgeling snapped a few photos on his phone of me glaring at him while sucking on the nebulizer. But we won't be looking at those today. Maybe tomorrow if I feel in the mood for a little sellf-mockery. Naptime? Sounds good.

Posted by midgeling at 08:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I meant to post this back on May 22. Obviously, I didin't get to it. Life has been insane with trying to finish up the move, get kids registered at the proper schools for next year and people getting sick.

I am going to be going to a cousin's wedding on June 28th, and I need something decent to wear. So I am knitting the Sapphire Wrap by Melissa Wehrle.

So I happened to do my shopping while the 2008 LYS Tour was going on. While at Renaissance Yarns I spent more than $25, so I got the lovely free tote bag you see in the photo. I am doing the pattern in the same color, but not the same yarn. The pattern yarn used is cashmere, which just isn't in my budget. I am using Louet MerLin (merino/linen), which isn't cheap either, but it isn't as much as cashmere.

I have one sleeve plus most of the second sleeve completed so far. I sure hope I will get it done in time. I am also hoping that the computer gets brought over to the new house soon. Until then, I still have to come over here to the old house to work and use the computer. Blech.

I hope everyone has a great weekend, and I hope to catch up with you all soon.

Posted by midgeling at 05:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Uncle Barney died in a motorcycle crash last Saturday, May 3rd. It was my aunt's birthday.
His memorial website will be here until May 20. The memorial service is being held this afternoon. I won't be able to make it to San Diego today.

Posted by midgeling at 09:39 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Okay, well not really. Mr Midgeling has some freaky allergic reaction going on in one of his eyes. I forgot to give him a Benadryl last night before bed, because I passed out sometime before 8. I was pooped. He was a sweetheart and put all the kids to bed and let me stay crashed out.

Anyway, back to my evil monkey ways. So he has this freaky eye thing going on, right? Well, I left my Zyrtec on the counter and told him that maybe he better take one of those today to try to get the allergy thing uunder control. And then I happily hopped on the bus to work. So he calls me a bit ago to let me know that the Zyrtec stuff messed him all up. It makes me feel like i am on crack, but apparently it makes him sleepy.

So one of the things on his list of things to do today was finish fixing up his motorcycle. Well, he is all drugged up, and wrecks at the top of the hill of the old house. I think his pager is in the bushes somewhere. So I drugged him up and then tried to get him to commit motorcycle suicide. Evil Monkey. He's okay. It was only a minor spin out type thing.

Life at the new house is great. The kids were thrilled because my mom drove up from Vancouver WA for a weekend visit. She helped me unpack and watched the kids while Mr Midgeling and I went to the old house load up and haul more stuff. I don't have any internet access at the new house yet, and I still don't have a card reader, so no photos just yet. I have a couple of things, but Harley took my SD card from my phone, so I can't even use thqt right now. Darn kid.

I hope you all have a good week. I will try to get caught up with everyone soon.

Posted by midgeling at 02:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

The house is legally, officially ours today. Well, us and the bank, anyway. It's so nice to finally have this over with. And no buyers remorse so far! I've even been looking at new listing and so far I haven't liked anything else better (in our price range, lol).

Still no card reader, you here you have a not so good phone photo of my Reversai socks that were Round 2 of Sock Madness. Um, okay. No photo. my darling daughter was using my phone and she still has it in her posession. So why is that a big deal? Well, she is at the new house with her father and I am here at the old house with the rest of the kids. We'll probably be doing the 2 house thing for this week until we can get more of our stuff moved.

Dang, I am so tired! I'm going to bed. I hope you all have a good week.

Posted by midgeling at 10:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Things were all looking up for a few days. It was nice. Monday was pretty easy for me. Then Tuesday came and bit me in my large posterior. Thanks to Kassie, I slipped on her jacket and wrenched my knee pretty bad. It hurts! I have finished socks that I took photos of. Lexa broke my flash card reader. So no photos. Would you believe that she managed to stuff two flash cards into one reader?

Mr Midgeling is being... difficult. He and I see differently about me having access to my paychecks. It's not like I spend them all. He's not exactly thrilled with my tithing to church. Last month was particularly rough for me, and he did a lot of stupid man-things that made me indulge in a bit of retail therapy. So today when he saw my bank statement for the account where all my paychecks go (that I am not supposed to use at all) and I had spent actual money, he jumped in my poop.

I did not take kindly to the aforementioned poop-jumping. I jumped back at him. I am still cranky about the whole business. Because there are a couple of issues that I let slide that I have every right to be pissed about. And now that it has come up again, I am angry all over again. Maybe it's because I have been perusing the Old Testament over again, but I swear, I am feeling like one of those poor purchased women-folk who had no right to the income they earned.

That man stole my zen.

In an effort to reclaim my zen, I will begin to sing one of my favorite songs by Bowling for Soup called "A Friendly Goodbye"

... Ain't that a "b" with an itch
Ain't that a mother trucker
You can go to H-E-double hockey sticks
And Eff yourself
Cause I'm flippin' gosh darn sick
Of all the "s" word you put me through
So Eff You!
Eff You! ...

Posted by midgeling at 08:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

I haven't done much blogging or knitting lately. There's been a lot going on for me. A couple of weeks ago we put an offer on this house that is perfect for our family. Chace makes me drive by it whenever we are nearby so that he can see it - he's REAL excited to be moving soon. Well, yesterday we noticed something when we did our semi-weekly drive by:

What did we notice? Well let's take a closer look at that red blurb there:

(camera phones are handy)

Yup! It's been sold. To us. We get the keys on the 28th. I am so thrilled!

Posted by midgeling at 10:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I finished my January Girl socks from the Zen String Sock Club. It was knit with Zen String Harmony DK (merino/tencel). The pattern was very nicely written and it turned out lovely. Angelina dyes up some truly wonderful yarn. I can't speak highly enough about her.

Detail of lace pattern.

It took my a lot longer to finish than I would have liked, but with my back so messed up, my left hand is still partially numb, and I still have problems with pain in my left arm. So I could only knit about 15 minutes at a time for most of the sock, and the last few days I was able to knit for over a half hour at a time with no real probems. I have been seeing a chiropractor and my regular doctor for a month now. This week I went from 3 visits to two visits per week to the chiro. I'd say the pain is about 70% better, but unfortunately the numbness hasn't gone yet. I am still spending a lot of quality time with my ice packs these days, lol.

I haven't been online as much as I like lately. I am behing on reading my favorite blogs since I don't really like to be sitting in my desk chair any more than I really have to. But since things are getting better, I think I will probably be getting back to normal. Oh, yeah. My doc is making me get an EMG to see exactly how much nerve blockage I have got going on. One of the things that drives me nuts is that my typing sucks even worse now. With my left hand numb, it types slower than the right. So I am constantly misspelling things, with all the letters typed by my right hand in the beginning of the word and the left handed letters showing up toward the end. My brain sends the signals like normal, but my left hand executes things much more slowly, and with the numbness, it isn't always apparent that my left hand is lagging behind. It drives me nuts. But things are getting better!

Posted by midgeling at 10:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I can't believe my baby is 5 already. She has been getting everything she wanted so far. Aunt Anne got her a kiddie electric guitar. It is perfect! And of course she has been getting Littlest Pet Shop toys as well. Her gift from her family is a sleepover pizza party next weekend at a motel with an indoor pool. Just the 6 of us. We wanted to do it this past weekend, but Lexa was running a high fever and Mr Midgeling had some downtime upgrade stuff he had to do for work.

I suspect that once her birthday money from Grandma Anderson comes in, she will be requesting a trip to Build A Bear Workshop, lol. Just like every year.

Posted by midgeling at 10:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Okay, I know this girl. Back in the day, she was a cute little curly headed girl with a best friend named M. Okay, so M would walk her home from school nearly every day. He spent hours at her house hanging out and even helping her mom to make dinner. I even remember him putting away groceries. So they were best buds from the age of like 9 or 10.

So fast forward to when they were 14. M breaks the news to the girl that he has to move to Phoenix. She is devastated and cries a lot for the next few weeks. After M moves, they rack up phone bills in the hundreds of dollars and really stress out the parents. Time goes on and eventually after the girly gets a jealous loser boyfriend, and she and M lose touch a couple of years into college.

Now, fast forward another 10 years. Thanks to the girl logging in to Classmates.com to look for a photo of someone for a friend, M finally gets in contact with her. Early this week, he emails her. She emails him back. He's been looking for her for the last 3 years. He's a biomedical engineer in AZ and insanely handsome. No longer the cute little skinny kid that I remember from years ago. He is just... Wow. He grew up real well.

So now they have been talking every day, catching up on the last 10 years, wondering why they have been apart for so long. If things continue to progress at the current rate, they will be madly in love and planning a future together. I want these two to get married and have lots of crazy pretty babies and live happily ever after. It just has to be that way. This MUST happen. Really. I'll be so sad if it doesn't.

I'll keep you posted.

Posted by midgeling at 09:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

We had lunch today at the Bluewater Taco Grill. It was sort of funny how we talked about how people and animals are sort of mentally linked. We talked about how we seem to be mentally linked, and we like it that way. The funny thing is that we had both ordered the same thing for lunch without knowing it, lol!

I like how Marti always just sort of listens and totally understands where I am coming from. No judgement. I can vent, she can vent, we can offer opinions or advice and it's all good. I had a bit of a rough weekend and was actually looking forward to going in to work today, since that meant lunch out and a needed chat!

She drives me nuts sometimes - I occasionally want to tell her "SLOW DOWN! Take better care of yourself!" But I have a funny feeling that I have that same effect on her too....

Posted by midgeling at 09:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

"Let's Play the Glad Game!" Pollyanna used to be my favorite movie when I was younger. Well, and when I was older, too. I just like it. A lot. I lost count of how many times I have seen it. [Okay, I just had a giggle fit over the lamest thing ever. I originally misspelled Pollyanna. Polyanna. I had visions of multiple girls named Anna all lined up like clones in a funhouse mirror. I tell you, I have been stressed.]

Okay, so for the last couple of months, things have really kind of sucked and I have been chanting to myself little blurbs about how things will get better. And for the last couple of weeks, my pissy alter ego has been yelling "LIAR!! You LIE woman!" But really. I do know I have a lot to be thankful for. Like my sisters and brothers and parents and extended family.

And Marti, is probably the best friend ever. Monday started off my particularly crappy week. During lunch she did one of those "Here, I think you should have this" things. She gave me a secret little gifty thing of yarn love that made my day. It was totally unexpected and is so what I needed to perk me up. Thank you. Non-fiber people just don't get it. It's almost like being given a kitten that doesn't need shots, flea spot, food or a litter pan. Trust me. It's a wonderful feeling.

And Marianne. Thank you. You leave me the nicest notes of support and encouragement. It really means so much to me. It is amazing how people in your life both face to face and a few hundred miles away can help you get through ugly stuff without resorting to poking out your own brain matter.

Okay, and here's something else I have been thankful for:

"No Mom, I didn't eat the gummi bears..."

She has been so sweet and helpful lately. She switches out my ice packs for me in the freezer. She showers me with kisses and tells me she hopes my back feels better. Last night this child was hilarious.

Lexa: Let's read stories tonight, Mom. We can real mine first, then we will read yours next.
[So we read Would You Rather Be A Bullfrog and Ten Apples Up On Top. ]
Lexa: What's your book called?
Me: Programming the Universe: A Quantum Computer Scientist Takes On the Cosmos by Seth Lloyd.
Lexa: Oooh! Cool. Like NOVA! But that's too hard for me. What's this one?
Me: This one is called Ocean breezes : Knitted Scarves Inspired by the Sea by Sheryl Thies.
Lexa:[opens book and pretends to read] Cool. Yarn, yarn, yarn... Yarn, yarn, yarn, yarn...."

And the last thing I have been glad about and thankful for: The sharp pains in my back are getting better. I have a ways to go, but I was beginning to wonder if I would ever show any improvement at all. I am able to knit for longer stretches of time (maybe 15 minutes) before my hand and arm start freaking out on me. Better is good.

Posted by midgeling at 10:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

I am at work. I have been here since 8:30 this morning. It's 4:15 right now. I only need to work 6 hours today. I don't want to go home. Mr. Midgeling is there with all the kids. Things haven't been going so smoothly these days. We haven't had a kitchen sink for a couple of months now. Since my back has been hurt, I haven't been able to do any cleaning. Cooking is about all I can do, and I even need help with that sometimes. I can't sweep or even fold laundry or I get horrible muscle spasms/stabbing pain with tingling in my back, neck and left arm. I can't even knit much before my hand starts to go all wonky and hurty on me.

So the house is a disgusting mess. Because, you know - I am the only person who will clean. I have been pushed past my breaking point. Last night sucked and today was filled with mind-blowingly ridiculous emails. I am beyond pissed and way into numb brained eye-rolling. I don't want to go home. I just want to go be alone somewhere. I need some mellow time.

Yesterday I was a bit into the self-pity. Not today. I am just disgusted and disappointed. Seriously disappointed. I suppose I am a bit angry, too. I am sick of excuses and people blowing me off. It is frustrating to know that nobody you live with honestly gives a crap about how you feel until you are having a full-blown meltdown where you wish death and destruction to everything around you. Why do people completely blow you off for days and weeks and months - they refuse to take you seriously until you are pushed past your breaking point? Then they look at you and have the audacity to say "Why are you so worked up?"

I really think that marriage/kids was not the right path for me. I am really not very good at any of this. But here I am, married with 4 kids. Not much I can do about it now except try to muddle through as best I can. The kids will all be grown and gone one day. Maybe by that time I will have figured out some of this chaos. For months I have just been going through the motions, getting through the weeks and not really seeing or feeling like it serves any purpose. I suppose this is just one of those desert periods that people go through. Oh, how I wish it was a "dessert period" instead, lol.

Posted by midgeling at 04:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Holy hell, this hurts. My back is still messed up. "Vertebral degeneration" sucks. I get to seew the chiro 3 times a week and hopefully squeeze in a massage. The muscle spasms have been most unpleasant. At least I can still knit, as long as I make sure that I keep my left arm supported.

I gave my mom and sister their Christmas gifts that I knit. I also made Kasey (my sorta-sister cause she's my brother's ex) a pair of red wool fingerless mitts. They turned out okay. Not perfect cause I designed and knit them while in a percocet haze. I had to laugh as I was knitting the second mitt because I had to knit in the same pattern mishaps (like the second pattern repeat had to have an extra plain round inserted before the twisted stitches) so that the two would match.

Mom and Laura seemed to like their socks and Kasey really seemed to like her mitts. In my haze of trying to ignore the back spasms, I forgot to take photos of the stupid finished mitts. Hopefully I will remember to take pictures of Kasey wearing them on Friday when they head back up to Seattle from Porkland.

I called the doc to ask for something to kill the spasms at night while I (try to) sleep. I hope she will call in a prescription. Now I need to lose 30 lbs and get a boob reduction, lol. Things can never be simple, can they?

Posted by midgeling at 10:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

My favorite socks. KPPPM. I wear them several days each week, lovingly hand washing and hanging them to dry. Well, sometimes when they are still damp, I use the hair dryer to speed things up. The stupid hard, disintegrating wood floors in this house are really hard on socks. I need to learn to darn socks now. I have extra scrap yarn.

I got my new phone. I love it. But it had a slight software malfunction and nuked my entire address book. From the flash card. I had no backup since The Beast is still dead, and there is no ETA on it's resurrection. I miss my poor computer. He was good to me.

My week has sort of sucked again. . My back is messed up, so I sleep like crap. It's a freakish pinched nerve thingy. It hurts from my neck, down between my shoulder blades and into my left arm. I had to drop Nathan off at work this morning after I dropped HK off because we both slept through both his alarms. I was a half hour late picking HK up from school on Monday cause I kept getting stopped by people about stuff at work, then got stuck behind some clueless people that took forever in the parking garage.

Oh, Kass and Chace were turned away from the bus on Monday because Chace isn't allowed to take his cello on the bus anymore. The Transportation dept said they have "airline-like restrictions" for their buses. Um, so why aren't they turning away all the kids bringing juice boxes in their lunches? They are carrying on more than 2 oz of liquid. Anyway, since I had the car, both kids stayed home from school and played on the trampoline and played Wii. Lucky them. So Chace won't be bringing his cello on Mondays, so they better either let him use a school instrument or else not get on his case when he shows up empty-handed. I hate this school district. I can't wait till we move.

I am a bit cranky, but I am convinced that things will get better. I stopped the inhalers a couple of weeks ago and I think my immune system is improving. I am still congested, but not outright sick anymore. Yippee!

Posted by midgeling at 01:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I finished that red Mohican hat yesterday. But that can wait. Baby is going to be my last photo posting of 2007. He's going to turn 12 in May next year. This laundry basket he's lounging in has been full of folded clothes for over a month now. I don't have the heart to empty it since it is his favorite napping spot these days. It mostly has summer clothes, so it's not like I am going to be needing them any time soon.

It's hard to believe another year has passed. I hope you all have a very Happy New Year. Best wishes for 2008!

Posted by midgeling at 10:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I just got back from dropping my 14 year old daughter off at her boyfriend's house. This is so not what I expected to be doing on a Sunday evening at 36 years old. Does this mean I am supposed to be a grownup now? I feel really old. On the bright side, he's a really nice kid from a nice family.

The Beast is still dead. No word from Mr Midgeling on how he plans to resurrect my beloved PC.

Posted by midgeling at 06:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

I blew up the processor on my PC. Mr Midgeling brought me home a spare to use until he can figure out how he wants to go about fixing the Beast. New processor only or new motherboard, video card, etc. [HK has informed me that I have just begun speaking "major geek" - so I guess I better tone it down.]

Okay, so I done brokeded my compooter. [You gets dat, HK?]

I also had to rip out about 6 rounds of the red Mohican Hat. 15% mohair in the yarn makes for nice and soft, but a major bitch to frog. [HK - the term "frog" means to "rip it, rip it" - get it? Now quit reading over my shoulder.]

And I have PMS and massive headaches. [I just smacked HK for yet another smartass comment. Now twice. And three times. The kid is on a roll.]

But on the bright side, Mr Midgeling took me out to dinner tonight when he got home. We had sushi! Yum. Now I have to go make me some green tea and suck down a few Advil. 2008 will be better. Really.

Posted by midgeling at 09:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I had a fit this morning. My family. They are slobs. Dirty pigs. I had orange juice spilled under my desk. Next to the banana peels. On my desk was a half eaten bagel and an empty pop tart wrapper. 14 year old didn't do the dishes last night like she was supposed to. Some genius clogged the bathroom sink with what looked like leftover spaghetti. I still have no kitchen sink.I had 6 rolls of packing tape. I had 2 rolls hidden from the kids. They found both rolls after apparently losing the other 4 rolls. Someone lost part of my desk tape dispenser. I did not make today's mail run. Every single out of town Christmas gift will be late this year. Again. I can't find the compact flash card with the Christmas card photos.

So after I yelled a bit and threatened to completely call off Christmas this year, I left the house. I went to Starbucks for a Venti drip coffee with room. I went next door to Qdoba for a Steak Fajita Ranchero burrito - naked. (ETA: "Naked" here means with the tortilla on the side. I was fully clothed. ) I ate quietly, then finished up my Christmas/birthday shopping. I bought packing tape, scotch tape and 2 bottles of wine to get me through the next couple of days. I am home now. Kids did dishes. HK even unplugged the bathroom sink. There's still a pop tart wrapper on my desk.

And thanks to Marianne:

You Are Eggnog

Rich, sweet, and probably a little drunk. Everyone who knows you tends to get a little fatter.

Heh. It fits.

Posted by midgeling at 03:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I just spent almost $300 on Christmas gifts for the kids today. And almost all of what I got was on sale.
And I am not done shopping for people yet.

Posted by midgeling at 02:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

These are my beloved kitties. Baby is the big boy at the top. Stella aka Fatty aka Fat Cat is the pretty little thing below Baby. She has the most adorable fat rear end that gives her the cutest waddle when she walks. We have a lot in common, except that her waddle is much cuter than mine. I really missed the most adorable shot of Baby licking the top of Stella's head, and her laying there with her eyes closed enjoying every minute of it. They refused to cooperate and repeat the scene for me.

And here is Harley creatively modeling another Christmas gift hat. Um, I don't really have much else to say about it. Harley pretty much leaves me at a loss for words.

Okay, I finished the hat several days ago, but I am only just posting it now. Why? Because Kassie brought home another virus. There were aches and congestion and fevers to go around. She gave it to her baby sister, who gave it to me. We all pretty much spent the weekend sleeping and taking over-the-counter drugs.

But a few minutes ago, I was listening to Knitters Uncensored on my iPod while knitting another Critter Scarf and watching Quilters TV on TiVo (yes, all 3 at the same time) and I realized that I was actually awake and had photos, so I may as well post them.

So there you have it. Another (not so) exciting day in my life. Oh, well there was the Starbucks Date earlier tonight. But that's another story to be told tomorrow.

Posted by midgeling at 10:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

That photo up there is yarn. I love yarn.

I am still alive - more or less. I still have that stupid cold thing that whipped the asthma up into a frenzy. I've been pretty sick for a couple of weeks. When you don't get a lot of oxygen, you do a lot of sleeping. I've been doing a lot of Christmas knitting. Hopefully most of my friends and family will get handknitted/handmade items this year. I just hope they appreciate them for the effort and love I put into them, and I won't be the unlucky person experiencing things like getting the handknit socks dumped in the trash "because we only wear store bought socks here".

I was mad enough this year to cook a scaled down Thanksgiving dinner of 25lb turkey, rice, peas, sweet potatoes, and homemade cranberry sauce. No stuffing, mashed taters or pies for us. Reason #1 is that our kitchen is in all kinds of remodeling hell. We have a broken dishwasher and no kitchen sink. Reason #2 is that I have been just too dang tired from being sick.

But it was a good day, even though due to a slight miscalculation and turkey label reading error, dinner wasn't ready until 8:30 opm, LOL!

Posted by midgeling at 03:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

photo of ivy in dead leaves on my back porch

Do you ever feel like running away and hiding because people may be getting too close to you? They may be getting to know you too well. They may see too far into your soul. They are within striking distance and that makes you uneasy.

Do you wonder if the uneasiness is your fear of allowing people to get to know you too well? Maybe it is really your inner instinct or angel of some sort warning you that it isn't all as it seems and to beware?

Do you think maybe I am a puppy that has been kicked too many times? Or is there something to this general feeling of wariness?

Posted by midgeling at 02:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Okay, my work is all f*cked up. My boss (the Business Manager) quit. The Admin Director is reposting her job as the Associate Director, because there is a supervisor that is "unofficially" slated to replace the Admin Director when he retires. So making ther the "Associate Director" makes it that much easier to take over for him when he's gone. I don't know of anyone who has anything good to say about working for her. All I have heard is that she is a bully. Great.

But that makes her my boss in a few short weeks. She is much like our current Admin Director. She is a BIG fan of delegating her work. I have been around too long and know too much for them to not hand me every stinking task under the sun. Oh, and did I mention that I am only half time trying to do a full time job? Yeah. Don't expect me to last there past Christmas.

We are currently not charging for Angio contrast because the supervisors are refusing to require their techs to record the amounts of contrast used. That is money lost every day. The Administration refuses to do anything about it. I went out of my way to figure out a simple way to keep track of contrast so we could charge. They are refusing to put one additional requirement on the techs, so we lose money. Every day. Every Week. Every Year. This means hundreds of thousands of dollars every year. For something that would require about an extra 30 seconds of typing per case.

I don't ever want to work for a state run facility ever again.

Posted by midgeling at 10:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Um, yeah. That's my desk.

Posted by midgeling at 06:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Do you ever just get sick of it all? I mean so many medications. Still fatigue, still coughing, still sick, still congested, still insomnia, still... blah.

Trying to cope with other people's drama isn't easy either. Work folks, family drama, running around all week playing the chauffer. It is grating. At least I have XM radio for the driving and sitting and waiting.

I am in a whiny frame of mind now. I think I will go do something fibery and try to snap out of it. Sleeping is good. LOTS of sleeping would be ideal, but unfortunately not in the cards for me until Saturday.

Posted by midgeling at 09:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I just realized that 4 years ago today, I made my first blog post here. My, how time flies.

Posted by midgeling at 07:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Harley's Birthday Socks are finally done. They were done toe up in a a garter rib pattern (1 rnd K2P2, 2 rnds K) with 2x2 ribbed cuffs and shart row garter stitch heels and toes. I just love the fact that some patterns are so ingrained that to me, they consist of one sentence and not pages of text or charts.

Here's a close up:

For Harley's 14th birthday, she chose one of the family favorite restaurants, Shanghai Garden. We always order Hand Shaved Noodles with chicken, Strawberry Beef (kid's favorite) and Pepper Salted Squid (my favorite).

Afterward, we crossed the street to spend some time at Kinokuniya Bookstore in Uwajimaya Village. I love that bookstore. Since Uwajimaya is celebrating their anniversary, they are having a 10% off sale. So I had to get a book. HAD TO. This book refused to let me go. I suppose to describe it, you would say it is Barbara G. Walker meets Cookie A. I can't wait to start playing with some stitch patterns.

So from us, Harley got a cute top that she wanted, a pair of socks, and a concert ticket to see Chiodos at the Showbox this weekend with a friend. I can't believe I am now the mother of a 14 year old. It scares me. I am getting old. I don't feel too much more than 14 myself.

Posted by midgeling at 10:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Okay, so yesterday was good. Sorta. Started out rocky - new church, narrow minded people that don't think that if you wear black that you can already have an established relationship with God. You know, you must be "lost" or something. Eh, we have a few churches to try out. And just maybe my family can teach these conservative peoples that you can be different AND Christian.

After that, we went to Weebug's house. We hung out for the day while went all supergeek on them and tuned up their PC and recovered music files from the iPod that was orphaned by their previous PC. It was fun in a sick and twisted kind of way. I got some sock knitting done. Quite a bit, actually. See?

Those are Nathan's Never Ending Socks. Those are supposed to sorta replace his blue Birthday Socks that were too small. And by "sorta" I mean, he still wears the other ones even though they are too small, but I wanted him to have a pair that fit since they were a birthday present. So here I have knit these socks with Lime N Violet sock yarn in the Basement Dweller colorway. 462 yards will not be enugh to comfortably fit his size 11.5 EEEE feet. So it's a good thing I bought Cutters Are People Too, because that's what color the toes of his monstrous socks are going to be. They coordinate quite nicely.

It feels like I have been knitting them forever. But really, it's just been since the beginning of July. But I may finish them this week! Woot!

Oh, and so in return for my hours of sitting at her computer ignoring everyone while she fed my kids, Weebug graciously gave me a big hunk of pretty fibery love. It's Lisa Souza fiber in the Lime and Violet colorway, of course! Do I have awesome friends or what?

Posted by midgeling at 08:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I have fallen in love. We finally got the XM Radio fixed in my car. When we first had it activated, I got a handful of crappy stations. Now I get them all. My favorites? The Message, Fred, Ethel, Lucy, Squizz and Fungus. And with me being the driver of the Kid Shortbus, this XM gets a LOT of use during the week.

You know what else I love? Frozen Blueberries. By tomorrow, I will have finished all 4 lbs in just this week. I put them in a small dish and let them sit out for a few minutes before I start eating them. I like them about half frozen. It's got much less fat than a bowl of ice cream. They are pretty, too.

On the drama front, i have spoken with a couple of friends and some things have gotten better. I just need to take a step back from the ugliness. A couple of enties back I was in a bad place. Everything came down on me all in one day and it was too much to handle all at once. I was told by someone that I shouldn't take on everyone's problems. While that is true, I am just the type of person who can't hear some bad news, learn that you've been deceived for a few months and just skate on by with a "Wow, that kind of sucks." Especially if it is several bits of bad news, one after the other, after the other...

But selectiveness. I need to learn that a bit better. I know that things overall happened the way they were meant to. But in the future I really need to be selective and show much more discretion and reserve when handing over trust. That has always been a hard lesson for me. I seem to have that psychic "FOOL" tattoo imprinted on my forehead. But as the mantra goes, "It will get better...:

Posted by midgeling at 06:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

And here's the lovely Lexa showing off her best friend Buddy and my birthday present from Weebug. It is Knitting Lace Triangles by Evelyn Clark. (Evelyn is such a nice lady. I remember years ago she sat near me in Margaret Stove's lace knitting class that we took at the Bellevue Fire station.)

I love the book, and of course I want to abandon all that I am knitting and start a new lace shawl for myself.

Oooh, and I got a $100 bill from one of my grandmas. Weebug thinks I need to buy a new Bosworth spindle. She may be on to something!

Posted by midgeling at 01:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

See? I have actually been somewhat productive in a fibery way these days. I actually finished spinning my Vacation Fiber! They were supposed to be 2 oz each. I bought what were said to be 1 oz balls of roving, 2 of each color. After it was spun up, I got 2.1 oz of the lighter color and 0.7 oz of the darker. Something tells me they need to get better at eyeballing fiber amounts.. And you even get to see bits of my newly installed kitchen floor as a backdrop.

Okay, so I actually finished spinning these like a month ago. But so much has been going on in my life. A trusted person turned out to be a dirtbag who likes to hit on women that aren't his wife. One friend who claims to be impartial is now trying to screw another friend via a court affadavit, or some such nonsense. But then this is the person who dismissed me a while back by saying "I'm apologizing in advance for ignoring you..." because she got a new friend "sent by God". I had to make a tough decision about switching churches. All the kids cried over it. Work is screwing me out of $660, and my boss lied about making sure I would be paid for all the hours I worked. So really, I was screwed out of much more than $660.00. My mom's birthday socks are ruined. I made the middle of the night drunken sock yarn purchase that I forgot about until it arrived on my doorstep (okay, this one is really sort of a LOL). Oh, yeah. I have been fighting an allergy-induced sinus infection for a couple of weeks now. So this morning, Kassie and I woke up with colds. Of course.

So I have been knitting, spinning and making Weavette squares. Like mad. Enough to make my fingers and hands hurt. But it soothes the soul. And my soul has been tested these last few weeks. I am disappointed greatly in one of my friends plus an acquaintance. Hurt by another, though I understand why she hid things - trying to protect me. Infuriated by my place of employment. Disappointed and hurt by my church. Things have been coming at me from all sides these days. But I know it will get better.

I can't believe that after all that I have been going through, I am still okay. I have a few great friends that I know love me. (Yeah, that's you Marti, Joy, Magy and Wonderful.) And also thank you to immediate and extended family that helps me deal with the freakishness that is my life. Nathan has been pretty damn supportive through it all. He could be saying "I told you so." but he hasn't.

Thanks to everything left in the universe that isn't trying to kill or maim me. I really do appreciate it.

ETA: The trusted friend that hit on women? No - he didn't hit on me. I'd have hit him back.

Oh, how I love Linkin Park. You're never too old for a little LP.

Linkin Park Lyrics

Posted by midgeling at 10:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Drama abounds yet again. So does another sinus infection. I have stuff to show. Spinning stuff. Knitting stuff. Weaving stuff. House stuff. Really, I do. But the stuff is all over the damn house, and the camera is here with me downstairs at my chaos riddled desk.

We got new floors. I found out some ugly news about people close to me. There are certain hypocracies and betrayals and such. My boss is deciding that I have to repay 16 hours of pay since I was out sick with strep and didnt have sick leave accrued yet. I made sure to make upt he time for those missed hours in teh following week, but she decided that since we hadn't agreed on comp time beforehand, her "hands are tied" and she couldnt authorize my comp time to cover those hours missed. Regardless of the fact that I worked those hours. And that I routinely work more than the 20 hours a week that I get paid for.

It's all too much. But I am thankful I have my family and at least a couple of friends that haven't totally lost it and contributed to the wave-o-shit that is pummeling my life. Oh, and yes. I feel free to use foul language here. Because some of the hypocrites that don't use the foul language just act foul in other ways behind the scenes. Secrets and lies and bullshit, I tell you.

Let's all grow up, grab a conscience, "let your yes mean yes and your no mean no", lose the hypocricy and all play nicely.

And then I will post photos tomorrow when I have gotten some sleep.

Posted by midgeling at 02:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Fifteen years ago today, I signed my life away to Mr Midgeling. And this is what he IM'ed me this morning:

Happy Anniversary - "Celebrating 15 years of Baby-making"

LOL! Happy Anniversary to you , too.

Posted by midgeling at 03:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Pretty sunset this evening, wasn't it? I snapped this photo just in time. In the time it took me to change lenses to the telephoto, ithe pink in the clouds was gone.

Oh, and earlier today, Harley and I went to the grocery store. When we returned home, we found Kassie and Lexa in the yard picking dandelions. Kassie was wearing her pink princess bathing suit. Darling Lexa was wearing nothing but a Costco-sized Tostitos corn chip bag. I asked her if Daddy knew she was wearing an empty chip bag. She told me he did. I told her to get in the house and put her clothes back on.

Mommy: Are you aware that your youngest daughter is in the front yard wearing nothing but a Tostitos bag?
Daddy: Yeah.
Mommy: And you didn't see anything wrong with that?
Daddy: No, she's dressed.
Mommy: In a TOSTITOS BAG.
Daddy: She came in and said her bathing suit was wet and she had to take it off, but she wasn't allowed to be outside naked. So she grabbed the bag and put it on. Then she ran outside.

I so wish I had been able to get a picture of her in the bag.

Posted by midgeling at 08:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We are back from vacation. We cruised the Pacific Coast of the US. Okay, so we didn't really see much of the actual coastline, but we drove from Seattle, WA to Orange County, CA and then back home again to the Seattle area. I am pooped.

I haven't finished unpacking yet, but I did manage to clean out the refrigerator (not perfectly) and do some grocery shopping. I have no idea where my camera is and most of the photos I took are on Nathan's Macbook right now.

I have a FO and made sure to buy some Vacation Fiber. I'll get y'all caught up soon, I hope. Right now, it's 8:20 pm and I haven't started making dinner. Sashimi and edamame tonight, with gyoza for chace and the little girls. Yum.

Posted by midgeling at 08:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

We are on vacation. At present, we are in Talent, Oregon at Nathan's grandma's house. In a few days we will be headed farther south to Santa Rosa to see his other grandma. Then after that, we head to San Jose for the 2007 Taekwondo Junior Olympics. After that, we head farther south to Orange County to see my Daddy.

I'm knitting. A lot. From Seattle to here, I got about 6 hours of car knitting time. The kids play with cousin Lawson, and I get more knitting time. I can't post pictures just yet. But I finished another pair of socks last week for the Sock Marathon.

I love vacation. I don't want to come back to Real Life from vacation. Ever.

Posted by midgeling at 05:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Drama Queens in my life pretty much are clueless that they are being very high school right now. I am not going to bother talking to them about it just yet since it would be ugly and there would be a lot of sniffling and denial from them. No point.

For the time being I have been keeping my distance to save my own sanity. They still call me whenever they need something from me. It's pretty one-sided right now. *shrug*

We lost 3 of the best athletes on our taekwondo team. Much of the reason was political and just crappy behavior, but some of the Elite Inner Circle will never understand how things they said and did pretty much ran these families off. There was crappy behavior on both sides, of course. But The Elite Inner Circle will never see any of their own fault. Ours family was almost one chased off after last season. We are still teetering on the edge as it stands. We know that if we end up leaving, we probably won't really be missed - except that we will be an unfortunate addition to the body count.

It is sad. These aren't bad people at heart. But their pride and their superiority really do a lot of damage to these kids and their families.

Posted by midgeling at 10:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Oh yeah. The Drama. Whatever. I consulted a couple of other friends to see if what was bugging me was me overreacting or the other person being weird. Both friends (independantly) came to the conclusion that what was said to me was kind of crappy and rather High School in nature. They can have their drama. I have been sort of keeping my distance for my own sanity's sake.

Speaking of High School Drama, I recently found out that my boss believes all the crappy things that my former boss Peter has been saying about me. That's why she gets all snippy and bitchy with me (though she did back down and get nicer when she heard that I thought that returning to that damn hospital to work was a big mistake.) If she believes that douchebag over me and my quality/quanitiy of work, then screw them all.

What is with people? I like to live as drama-free as I can. It leaves me more time and energy for the fun things. Life has been much easier since I have started making it a point to act as much like a Clueless Male as possible (husband taught me this). Don't take things too seriously or too personally. Let people be crappy if they insist - pretend not to notice because it pisses them off even more.

I forgot my camera at Aunt Anne's yesterday. It's a 45 minute drive to her house. *sigh* And Kassie, in her 5 year old brilliance, put my cell phone in her cup of milk tonight during dinner. I didn't know she swiped it. She didn't know it would break. [headdesk] Before I lose my last couple of marbles today, let's close with something pretty. My rosebush has 25-30 roses blooming right now. Breathe deeply....

Posted by midgeling at 08:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

ED: I have been trying to write and post this stupid thing since Monday, and it is now Thursday. If it's not me being sick, it's friggin DRAMA everywhere. I'd like to personally tell everyone shooting out their negative vibes to go screw themselves. I don't need anything else negative this week.

Okay, so I have been sick. SICK. It's really a drug withdrawal (NO, not like methadone or anything like that). The mail order pharmacy screwed up my prescription, tried to fill the old one instead of filling the new one, which led to contacting the doc, who was wondering what-the-hell-is wrong-with-you-can't-you-read-the-paper-she-mailed-in-why-did-you-click-the-wrong-thingy-on-the-computer? So due to the pharmacy getting confused by a new piece of paper vs an old prescription still in their computer, I ran out of my medication. Okay, so why do I need these meds? To prevent my body from freaking out like it did these last 4 days. It all started Friday. Nausea, gastrointestinal ugliness, insomnia, fatigue, dizziness, numbness and prickly feeling hands and fingers, difficulty regulating body temperature - oh and the never ending migraine from HELL. Oh yeah - and I had allergy problems to contend with also.

And since physical crappiness wasn't enough, I must have drama elsewhere. Work is pretty much the same brand of stupid it always is. Nope. It is my friends that are wiggin me out. Weebug has her typical struggles - which aren't an issue for me (past my feeling of wishing I could do more to help her out when things get rough). But she is my nice little chunk of relative sanity these days in the friend department. Thank God for her. Really.

(Okay, that was written Monday and Tuesday. Today is THURS-friggin-DAY. Here's the part where I skip to the photos and then do a mental/emotional vomit post later on.)

Okay, so Saturday was a tournament sponsored by Untalan's Taekwondo in Graham, WA. Here's Harely doing her thing. She lost 10 to 12, but she did so good. The girl was pretty terrified of her. My favorite moment was when Harley kicked her in the gut/chest area, the girl went airborn, arced and landed flat on her butt with a gigantic THUD. It looked like a cartoon scene. The girl was okay, but it was one of those moments where you felt like you were in a real live Roger Rabbit movie.

And here is the mess that is my bag. I have a sock in some self striping Mama Llama and a Cascade Fixation baby sweater based on the Bamboo Baby Sweater in the One Skein Wonders Book. They are tangled and I was prevented by Mr Migraine from detangling the mess to get a proper photo.

I need to regroup for a bit. My grasp on my sanity and nice-nice is very tenuous at the moment. I may go into full-blown bitch mode in a bit. Have I said that I hate drama? Um, yeah. Well I hate it. And my life is full of what feels like high school crap at the moment. If you want to avoid this kind of thing, don't have any friends and don't, don't DON'T let any of your children do competitive sports on a damn elite team.

Posted by midgeling at 10:18 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Broken Molar. This problem needs to be managed as soon as possible, since irritation to the side of the tongue can have unfavorable consequences. Options will include refilling of tooth and a crown or simply extraction of this tooth.

Gingivectomy. A gingivectomy is a type of minor surgery that involves the removal of a small amount of gum tissue around a tooth or teeth.

Ibuprofen. This fever reducing, pain relieving, blood thinning compound was introduced in 1974 and is often used where pain relief is needed without a large anti-inflammatory effect.

Rogue Brewery Mocha Porter. Ruddy brown in color, a bittersweet balance of malt and hops with a light cream finish. Mocha Porter is made from Northwest Harrington and Klages; 135-165, 95-115, and 70-80 Crystal; Beeston Chocolate, Black, Munich and Carastan malts. Perle and Centennial hops. Mocha Porter is available in a 12-ounce 6-pack, the classic 22-ounce bottle, and on draft.

Posted by midgeling at 10:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

We have had a joke that the two middle children are for sure Nathan's, but we may need to get a maternity test because they really aren't at all like me. They don't look like me or act like me.

Tonight, Kassie proved to me that she is my daughter.

Kassie is 5, and she decided to knit a scarf and mittens for Princess Leia Bear. So Harley cast on a few stitches with Kassie's very own needles I bought her to teach her to "poke, wrap, weee" and knit a few rows. So Kassie took over. But then we came downstairs for a while, got a snack and putzed around on the computer for a while.

A bit ago, Kassie was crying and running from room to room wailing "Where's my knitting?!?!?! Waaaaaaahhhhhhhh!!!!!! I can't find my knitting!!! Baaaaahhhhhhhhh!!!! Mommy, where's my yarn? I NEED my yarn!!!"

Yup, she's my kid.

Posted by midgeling at 10:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I am here. We just got back from taekwondo jr olympic regional qualifiers. Harley got silver for junior sparring and gold for senior sparring. But seniors she automatically got gold since she was the only one in her division. She did really well.

I have news upon news to post. But that will have to come later. I am tired. I have a cold that I brought back as a souvenir from porkland. I have to find the pictures that I took.

The mail brought me yarn. And then I got yarn in the mail. Oh, and then more yarn came in the mail after that, lol.

I just want to say THANK YOU to my lime n violet secret pal. She is awesome. I will be posting pictures after my tea and second nap of the day.

Posted by midgeling at 04:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Happy Autism Awareness Month! Heheh. Now if that isn't a loaded statement. I have an autistic son who will be ten on the 12th of this month. He has Asperger's, to be exact. When I have delt with people concerning this "condition", I get a variety of reactions. Some are actually pissed, miffed, etc. that people observe this kind of "awareness month" with yellow ribbons and bumper stickers. Some are pissed at almost all of the characterizations parents of autistic children make about how autism is a "cruel disease" (is it even a disease? or more like a condition?). Some people even deny that Asperger's is real, or that it should be classified as one of the Autism Spectrum Disorders. Don't get me started on the visit with the pediatrician that took over when our old pediatrician (Dr Melvin Morse) retired from practice.

I tend to not really like people calling it a"disease" or a "disorder". My son is not diseased, but he is rather disordered. You should see the mess that is his room. After a year of hard work in occupationaol therapy, Chace for the most part seems like a normal boy with a few eccentricities. Okay, maybe several eccentricities. But they are part of his charm. They make up part of his sweetness and innocence.

Chace is sometimes slow when it comes to understanding jokes, sarcasm or metaphors. He can at times be friggin brilliant when he talks to you about string theory, black holes, DNA mutation or Legos. He is the sweetest boy you will ever meet. He loves babies and toddlers. And not so strangely, they really love him too.

I have had people ask me some rather strange and interesting questions. Most have had to do with people not believing that he is my son by birth. He pretty much looks like a dark haired white boy while I am really, obviously asian. But if you stand him next to his sisters, people can see the asian features in him a bit better. But a couple of times I have gotten questions like "If you could , would you go back in time and make him 'normal'?" or "Have you ever considered trying for another boy so you could have a 'normal' son?"

While these questions didn't offend me or make me angry, they made me think. The answer is NO. I love him the way he is. I love his quirks. I love that he sees the world differently. (Aren't the most innovative engineers and scientists people who are able to approach a subject from a different point of view?) He makes me think about things differently and he is always teaching me new things. We have some of the nerdiest conversations, and I love every minute of them. And I don't ever wish for a "normal" son. All I know is Chace and I am quite happy with him. Sometimes I wish we could have another boy, but that is because for more years than I can remember, he has been asking for a baby brother.

I try to teach Chace that Asperger's isn't a disorder or a disease or a problem. To him, Asperger's just means that he is smarter and thinks a bit differently than the average person. His brain is so high-powered, it has a hard time slowing down or turning off. His brain tries to pay attention to every detail of every thing going on in the room. That is why he gets overloaded and prefers quiet more than most kids. He is mostly okay with Asperger's now. The last time Michael the Bully tried to tease him and tell him that he was stupid, Chace just laughed at him and said "No, I'm not. You are just jealous that I am so much smarter than you."

I can't even express how proud of him I was that day.

Posted by midgeling at 11:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

4 out of the 6 people in my family made a trip to the doctor today. Kass needed a followup for her sinus infection/bronchitis episode. Harley needed to be seen for her allergies and the infected spots on her face and ears. Nathan needed to be seen for his sinus infection and probable case of strep. And I needed blood work fto go with my annual exam (oh, goodie) that I had on Wednesday.

So... Kass is okay and probably doesnt have asthma just yet. Harley had a case of eczema and/or bug bite on her face that turned into a staph/strep/viral infection. She also had a sinus infection (again for the second time this year). Nathan was just all around crappy and I happily donated blood to the nice, needle-wielding phlebotomist in the office.

So 6 prescriptions and $96 later, Harley and Nathan are drugged out and feeling slightly better. And we still have 3 prescriptions yet to be filled out by mail-order. Sheesh. Harley's allergies are as bad as mine. Thank God our insurance is good.

I started another sock while I was at the dojang watching Chace's class and got to work on it more today at the doc's office:

KPPPM, size 000 (1.5 mm) needles, 80 sts around in 2x2 ribbing. Too damn big. To be honest, I ended up with 80 stitches because I was happily watching the taekwondo class while increasing away on the toe. And when I realized I had 80 stitches, I thought to myself "Oh, that won't be too many sitiches, after all, I am working on 000 needles!!! That's just crazy to begin with!" Rip, rip, rip......

Aaaah, much better fit. I am still on 000 needles, getting about 9 sts to the inch and 72 stitches here is working muuuch better. And 72 is like the most common number used in sock patterns. So I decided to do the Conwyn Sock from Nancy Bush's Knitting on the Road. You can't really see the pattern too well yet. Hopefully as I get more into it, it will look a bit more distinct. I thought it would show okay, because the yarn I am using is similar to the yarn used in the book. But I'm not so sure now. Eh, I don't care if it is obscured. It's a fun pattern. That's what counts.

Oh, and the yarn? I got it in trade with Weebug for the leftover yarn from my Mad Cow socks. I had 65g of black and 75g left of the zebra stripe. She is using it to add to her Opal of the same colors make her new nephew a baby sweater. It looks good so far!

Posted by midgeling at 03:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

This morning is sort of good. My boss decided to get me to set a schedule. So I start work at 9 every morning. I actually work less this way. It seems that I was working for free before - I wasn't really good about reporting the actual hours worked. I got my breakfast, snapped a fuzzy photo and sat down here to type. Fuzzy photo seems sort of appropriate since I feel fuzzy-headed since I haven't yet finished my coffe. Harley and Chace are both home sick today - Harley with stomach flu and Chace with strep. Yup, he must have caught it from me.

Here you see my coffee and bagels. The coffee is in my giant Starbucks Portland coffee mug that I got at the 2006 Taekwondo Friendship Tournament (I think) in Portland at the Rose Garden. I had another mug from Junior Olympics in Atlanta, but some person who refuses to identify themselves broke it. I am still sort of traumatized by the demise of my favorite coffee mug, so I haven't been able to throw it away. The chipped-to-hell mug is still on my kitchen counter. The bagels look kinda gross, but they are really quite tasty. They are lightly toasted and have balsamic, fresh mozzarella, proscuitto and sun dried tomatoes. Yummy!

The sock is Froeliche Wolle (I always want to sy "Frohliche Weinachten" - Merry Christmas). It's stripey pinks and purples, and the pattern is S12 Scalloped Socks. I was part of the Opal Sock of the Month Club several years ago and never managed to make these socks. I screwed them up somewhere along the line - I suspect sometime at yesterday's visit to the pediatrician. I get to tink back a couple of rounds so I can get moving on this sock again.

Posted by midgeling at 07:53 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Um, has it been that long for me? I cannot stop staring at this photo and having to wipe the drool off my chin every few minutes. *gulp* Yeah, and the scarf is pretty cool too, huh?

Bad, bad monkey.

Posted by midgeling at 10:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Lexa's Preschool question of the day: "What's wrong with you? Don't you understand Chinese?"

Nope. And neither does she.

Posted by midgeling at 11:56 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Brief history: I was sick almost all of December. I was sick for a couple of weeks in January, and now in February, I had the case of Strep Infection From Hell. This is my last day on antibiotics, but I still have sinus headaches and an occasional earache/gooey ear. I am tired. Still tired. I still need naps every couple of days to make it through the week. I am worn out and feeling ragged.

Concession A: I will not make all Dozen Days in January. I still have a couple of the photos I took, but never was able to write an entry about and post. It was fun. I tried. I did what I could, but the timing was just really bad for me. EDIT: As weebug has pointed out to me, I misread the stupid Dozen Days thing. I don't need to do a Dozen Pics per month for every friggin month. Just one or more every month, lol. You ever have those "Duh, I be stoopid" periods? Yup - I am suffering from that right now. I will go sit in back in the corner now. *sigh*

Concession B: I hate my job. I hate the hospital I work for. I hate the department I work for. I have hated it for years, but for the time being, I am stuck and have to try to make the best of it until I can get out and make some changes.

Concession C: My house is a mess. In every sense of the word Mess. Cluttered, dirty, falling apart and in need of repairs, etc. And Someone needs to take care of all that. And by Someone, I mean Me. That is my Duty. I am the Domestic Goddess, so I need to oversee it all. My motivation here? My kids deserve better. I deserve better. It sucks that I must oversee and conquer it alone in the leadership department, but that is just how it is. I need to do the best I can.

Concession D: People are going to make fun of me because of my faith. Even people I love and care for. It doesn't matter that my church teaches love and tolerance because we are all God's children. I don't hate other faiths, other ethnicities, gay people, or handicapped people. I try not to be judgemental, but i know that I struggle with that one sometimes because I am human, after all. But I try. But I believe what I believe and I have many reasons for it. But it still hurts when people twist what for me is love, hope and acceptance (despite my many flaws) and turn it into something ugly and call me a hypocrite. I hate it when people use God as a Punishment. It hurts. It makes me cry. It makes me not want to trust even those people I am supposed to be close to.

Now that I have that out of my system and out of the way, I need to remember that I still have hope. Even if I keep getting sick because I am wearing myself out, I will still pick my ass up and trudge on. I may not always be happy about it and I may whine about it along the way, but I will still move on. It has to get better for me.

I am going to post my photos later of the socks I finished and sent off to my mom. That makes another pair for the L&V Sock Marathon! Woot!

"The capacity for hope is the most significant fact of life. It provides human beings with a sense of destination and the energy to get started."
- Norman Cousins

Posted by midgeling at 11:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

I don't know what is worse. The strep infection in my damn sinuses or the Levaquin to kill it. The headache, nausea and vomiting from the Leviquin? Yeah. Makes me feel almost as bad as the damn strep. Strep sucks. This is Day 3 on antibiotics and I still feel like doo. I know that bacterial infections are worse than garden variety viral infections. But usually after day 3 on meds I feel slightly better.

I could only do housework in like 5 minute increments today, and after dragging my sorry ass out of bed to get Chace off to the bus, I had to take a 2 hour nap just to prep myself for getting Kassie to school. And After working for 4 hours, I was wiped out and feeling achy again. Having a strep infection at 35 feels way worse than it did at 15. I am old. Okay, well I feel old.

Here it is 1:30ish and I can't sleep because my ears are doing weird things to drive me batty, my sinuses hurt like a bitch and the puke factor is through the roof. Dear God, I need a miracle. Soon. Please.

Posted by midgeling at 01:33 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

I have strep. In my sinuses. And I have fluid in my left ear (so I guess that means that my headphones really aren't broken). And that is why I have been feeling like death since Saturday. I started getting sick on Thursday and it all went downhill fast. My doc gave me a prescription for miracle drugs yesterday, and today at 9:45 we go in again so she can tell me that Harley has strep too.

On the bright side, I haven't worked all week and I have been averaging 18 hours of sleep a day.

Posted by midgeling at 07:16 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I have the flu. Advil and tylenol don't kill the fever and the pain all the way. HK is sick too. I want my mommy!

Posted by midgeling at 11:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Holy crap, Batman. I am overwhelmed.

Okay, so I am really writing this post on the 30th, but I have to date it the 24th so it inserts itself in the proper order. Whatever.

I have several posts in "unpublished" status that I need to wortk on and tweak before I publish them (not like it matters too terribly much. Most of my readers are habital lurkers like me - but yeah, I see the web stats so I know you are there, lol.

All my Snap A Dozen Days photos are languishing on my flash card or on the server. I was hoping to get to catching up over the weekend, but every time I tried to sit down in front of this Beast, there was someting to cook, clean, bathe or yell at. And when I returned, a couple of someones were playing World of Warcraft on my computer. Yeah, MY computer. Cause it kicks ass (but needs a better video card) over the laptop.

Chace: "But MOM, there's this new quest for Burning Crusade that I am working on and...."

And there is work. Don't get me started, I don't wanna go there right now.

Updates will come ASAFP.

Posted by midgeling at 02:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Denver was fun. I was there for my Grandma's 80th birthday - surprise party. There was snow everywhere! I loved it. Here's the house we stayed in. My mom's cousin Janice was kind enough to have 5 of us over for the weekend. So it was me, my mom, my sister and 2 brothers.

This house is gorgeous. Janice's husband is a contractor and they bought a smallish house many, many years ago and remodeled it. It is incredibly beautiful.

Anyway, I am off to bed. I have a busy week ahead of me. I need to clean up everything that the kids destroyed in my absence.

Posted by midgeling at 10:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

She did it. She did it again. The Little Darling decided she needed bangs, so she did a little self-styling.

This is my not-so-girly-girl. She isn't as pink and frilly as Kassie. Lexa's favorite color is blue. But the child has a thing for art, scissors, style and shoes. Well, she has a thing for boots, actually. She is locally known as "the little girl with the boots". Her latest acquisition is a pair of hot pink cowboy boots.

Here she is modeling the boots at Aunt Anne's on Christmas Eve - the outfit is complete with chocolate smudge on face, Blue Bear, broom horse, cowboy hat and yellow hapi coat from Japan.

She promised me many times she wouldn't ever ever cut her hair again. Ever. At least this time she seems to have done a decent job of it.

Posted by midgeling at 04:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

We had a rather intense windstorm last Thursday that left about a million or so people in the Puget Sound area without power. 4 people were killed when trees fell on their cars and one woman drowned after being trapped in her windowless basement. How awful for these people. Our neighborhood was a mess, but no major damage. thousands are still without power. We were pretty fortunate. The kids had no school on Friday, and Harley's school was still closed today. I had no car and the bus never made it up to our area, so I had yet one more day with everyone at home.

And we are sick. Well, Chace and I are sick. I am pretty miserable. I slept until noon and I am already ready for a nap. I frogged the Broadripple socks. I am knitting another pair using Regia Ringel in bues and turquoise. I am actually on the second sock. Go figure. I have no idea what is up with my speediness these days.

Okay. I have my vanilla almond decaf tea in hand. I am off to bed again.

Posted by midgeling at 01:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I never thought we would do it, but we did. We traded in the Little green Short Bus for a New Black Short Bus. The new one is PRETTY. I just love her. She is new and black and shiny and CLEAN. The dealer was having a customer appreciation event last night. They fed as dinner and plied as with wine. They gave out prizes, but we didn't win any. At about 8:30, we started talking to the sales guys about the car. After giving Nathan 6 beers or so and some intensive negotiations (LOL!), we drove off at 11:41pm with 4 Candy canes, 2 balloons, a magnum of champagne and a new car. It was a very weird experience.

And now for squeee the second. ("Squeee" is a term I have become reacquainted with courtesy of Ms. Lime and Ms.Violet.) My Socks that Rock arrived, so I started searching for the perfect pattern. I thought I would do the Broadripple socks, but for some reason I decided I wanted to do them Toe up. I can't recall why I wanted to do them toe up. But I did some research and found the Magic Cast On for Toe-up socks. So I happily knit away and got several inches into the toe when it dawned on me that the sock was awfully W-I-D-E.Yup, my gauge was right on, but my feet are just really small. So I had to alter the pattern to make the circumference about an inch smaller. I also had to reverse the decreases to make everything point the way I wanted the zigs to zag.

So I explained all this to Nathan last night when we were going to bed. He pointed out that I had basically written my own pattern and just based it on a design I liked by the time it was all done; and I should write it all down and post it. Good idea. (BTW, this colorway is called "Henpecked".)

Posted by midgeling at 08:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

We are having a rain and snow mix right now. The snow is melting and the icicles are getting very drippy. The air is still pretty darn cold and the steets are icy. *sigh* By tomorrow we will just be slushy and wet.

Posted by midgeling at 11:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

He looks cute doesn't he? He busted into my favorite knitting bag I bought from Levenger and tore into the felted catnip mouse kit I bought from Schoolhouse Press and then the dumb piece of crap PEED 0N MY M~FING BAG!!

I hate that cat. We have always had a difficult relationship, but the stupid fuzzbutt blew it once more. He better hope Woolwash and Febreeze get rid of the smell.

Posted by midgeling at 11:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Last night it took Nathan 2 hours to get home from work - I let him drive my car to work since I wasn't planning on going anywhere and driving would sure beat a bus ride in the snow. It was snowing like mad yesterday, and the kids were loving it. It meant snowmen, snow angels, snowball fights - and they got to stay home from school. Anyway, Nathan managed to get up The Hill, but started sliding into the alley while trying to get up to our driveway. So Thompson (our neighbor who grew up in our house but now lives 2 doors down) told Nathan to bag it and just park in his driveway.

So my Little Green Shortbus (as I affectionately call her) is having a 2 day sleepover with the neighbor. I got excited when the snowplow guy started making his way up our street. My hopes were dashed when he got halfway up the street and he turned back around. He started sliding and gave up. Oh, well. Here's a photo taken from my front porch:

I just remembered that I have another FO - a scarf that is intended to be a Christmas gift for one of Harley's friends. I will have to post that later. And I am almost done sewing in the zipper of the Jolly Green Tomten! Woot!

Posted by midgeling at 06:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Stella the Princess has taken over the bear bed that was purchased at Build a Bear on Kassie's birthday. Here she is napping and pretending to be annoyed.

The girls and I did some Christmas shopping this evening, and on our way out to Redmond, it started snowing. By the time we drove home, it was really coming down. The big kids are all hoping for a snow day tomorrow. There is supposed to be 1"-3" of snow accumulation by morning. That will probably mean a snow day if that ends up being true. It is funny how if a bit of moisture falls out of the sky, things come to a screeching halt. Part of me is also secretly hoping for a snow day as well. But don't tell the kids.

Posted by midgeling at 09:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I had a whole entry all typed out, and then one wrong click... it was all gone. So I am going to go with short blurbs of To-The-Point-ness.

Happiness is finding a squid topped pencil at the grocery store:

Misery is cutting a piece of your finger off while cooking dinner:

Shared misery is when your oldest daughter tries to help with dinner by draining the boiling pot of macaroni onto her thigh while you try to stop the finger bleeding:

After an ER trip for somme burn cream, bandages and Tylenol with codeine, Harley is doing much better. I looked, but never found the missing piece of finger.

I finished the Jolly Green Tomten. I sewed the zipper in while I was at Weebug's house last Saturday. I hate the placement, so I am going to rip it out and sew it back in again. Well, once I find my seam ripper and grow back the tip of my finger. (Typing and knitting are really difficult without the use o your left index finger.) I will post photos when I think it is more presentable.

But for your viewing pleasure, I give you Harley's fuzzy scarf. I finished knitting it yesterday but still need to weave in ends and add the fringe (ack!). I don't care for fringe myself, but Harley wants it.

Posted by midgeling at 08:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Tuesday was voting day. It was also Flood Day. I am registered to vote in Duvall, so i drove out to the Duvall Church to vote. Aunt Anne lives on 124th. The entire Snoqualmie River Valley was flooded. It is usually used as cow pasture by small farms. This is a photo of the bridge (behind the tree) on 124th going into the south end of Duvall from Redmond:

And here is another photo looking west toward the bridge - the opposite diection of the first photo:

I left Duvall at 12;35 pm. They had closed the 3 other routes out of that town already. They closed the last road in and out of Duvall at 1:15 pm. I barely made it! I was almost Anne and Doug's houseguest overnight!

Posted by midgeling at 11:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I have had all these Suzy Homemaker urges these days. It is starting to frighten me. I even like my husband. Scary, no? I made applesauce the other day. The kids and the husband picked apples off the trees in the yard, and I peeled and cooked them. It looks like poo because I put the cinnamon in while it was cooking instead of after, but it tasted awesome.

Okay, please try not to laugh, but today I sewed an apron. Yes, an a p r o n. I checked out Egg Money Quilts by Eleanor Burns from the library. I checked it out because I saw the QIAD episode on PBS where she made the apron. I thought it was cute and would look good in some funky retro-type fabric. And I think it does. Here is Harley modeling it for me:

I have been cleaning around the house, too. Well, I think that is what I was supposed to be doing today or something while Nathan is at his friend's house overnight playing WoW all day and night. At least that is what he told me he wanted me to do. I made stuff instead. Cleaning? I am not that domestic. In my defense, I have been better about being the house nazi and making sure everyone keeps their crap out of the way more. The house in in no way "clean" but it is a hell of a lot better than is has been. I just keep telling myself that it is better and that is what counts.

Posted by midgeling at 09:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

As random as my life is, I started out reading a gossip blog, clicked on a link for Lilly Allen's myspace (I like her and didn't realize she had one) and from there decided to log in to my account and see if I had any messages. So I notice that my old school had some notice that new people signed up. I am normally never curious since I went to 3 different high schools, but for some reason I clicked on La Cueva's link. From there I read a notice that 2 of my favorite high school teachers died in a car crash like a week ago. This is awful.

Two La Cueva High School teachers die in car crash

I didn't know Ms Briscoe as well, though I had her for Honors AP World History. She was the nice teacher that everyone loved. People used to breathe a sigh of relief when they would see her name on their newly assigned class schedules. She made class interesting and made sure people knew that it was better to think for yourself and question what was going on around you, rather than just accept whatever people tried to push on you.

Ms Brice was my Honors AP English teacher. She was a total hardass (but always fair) and bitched me out pretty regularly. I thought she didn't like me. One day she pulled my off to the side at the Career Day being held in the cafeteria. "What are you doing here? Do you honestly think that there is any point in you being here? With the choices you are making, you won't have a career. I hear you are dating Michael [a guy in English class]. He is a loser and a piece of shit. He is going nowhere with his life. You are smart, pretty and you have a bright future ahead of you if you straighten yourself out. You need to stay away from him or he will drag you down with him."

Needless to say, I was stunned and speechless. That was the moment I realized that she didn't dislike me, and there was a reason she was always so hard on me. And she actually called Michael Hartman a piece of shit during school! To a student!

Continue reading "RIP Ms Brice and Ms Briscoe" »

Posted by midgeling at 10:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

It has been 14 years and we haven't killed each other yet. Not bad...

Posted by midgeling at 10:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Bad news: Went to the dentist today and I need a 15 year old silver filling replaced with a nice gold crown. Lexa needs 3 fillings. Kassie needs 1.

Good News: Chace and Harley's teeth are just peachy. But wait. It gets better...

On the way back from the dentist, we always stop at the Australian Pie Company for lunch. That's my (at least) semi-annual piece of artery clogging heaven. Okay, so I am driving down Aumbaum toward the Pie Co. Then, like I do twice a year, I turn left on SW 152nd. On the right side of the street, about 10 shops before my intended lunch stop, I see a sign that says "Yarn Stash".

Yarn Stash.

How can you not stop? So I give an excited squeak, say "That wasn't there before!" and whip into the nearest parking spot. Harley groaned and said "Oh, no! Not another yarn shop!" So I leave her in the car with the little kids while I bounced into Yarn Stash.

The lady I spoke to was very nice. Judging from the business card, it was either Bonnie Moore or Beth Malaykhan. It turns out that the store used to be on SW 135th Street, but they moved recently. Okay, so after a brief chat, I bought a skein of Sierra Quatro in Creme Brulee to make the September Dishcloth from the Dishcloth KAL. It was suggested that Fall colors be used for this one. I know, Quatro makes for an expensive dishcloth, but the colors are pretty. I also bought a ball of Cascade 220 superwash in sort of a fuschia color and one and one ball in a deep purple color. I have a couple of friends with babies getting ready to be born, and I have some more baby kimonos I want to knit.

So I finally walked out of Yarn Stash with 1 skein + 2 balls of yarn, after signing up for their newsletter and birthday club. (20% discount all next month since it is my birthday 9/19!) I am a happy girl. I like that yarn store. It is smallish, but open, friendly and lots of natural fibers. There seemed to be a nice variety with a good range of colors. It is definitely a good place to go if you like Cascade. And it is just a few doors down from my beef and mushroom & beef, tomato and onion pies!

EDIT: Bonnie and Beth clarified that it is ONE 20% off shopping trip this birthday month. That's what I meant, but in my excitement, made it come out all wrong, lol!

The Yarn Stash
615 SW 152nd
Burien, WA 98198
206-246-2727
theyarnstash@hotmail.com

Tue-Fri 10am-6pm
Sat 10 am-5pm

Posted by midgeling at 12:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Okay, that was lunch. We had rotisserie chicken the other day for dinner that I cooked on the grill. So today I decided to take the leftover chicken and make some chicken noodle soup. It was TASTY. Orange bell peppers, celery, carrots, onion, roasted garlic, noodles and chicken chunks. Yummy!

Okay, so here is part of my stash. It is a couple of dozen skeins of various colors and varieties of brown sheep, 30 skeins of Peer Gynt in gray, white and black, a couple hundred yards of pale blue laceweight mohair, and about a dozen skeins of worsted weight shetland in an assortment of colors. It is in a dead Space Bag here on top of my chaise lounge. Space Bags do not do well in homes with spastic cats.

My stash is now in a 30 gallon plastic purple Sterilite container that is doubling as a coffee table. Yeah, I am ghetto. I can't help myself. If you saw my house you would understand why a 30 gallon plastic bin is a step up. As soon as I finish boxing up the weird crap here in my living room, I am painting these nasty kid-smudged walls. I need a change.

Can you believe that? That is only part of my stash. A small part. And just yesterday I bought 9 skeins of cotton yearn for the Monthly Dishcloth group that I joined last week. This is out of control. I think I have a problem (shhhh... don't tell Nathan). "Hi. My name is midgeling. I am strugling with a yarn addiction. And a book addiction. Please don't judge. I am doing the best I can. I will overcome."

And the Yarn Diet begins...

Posted by midgeling at 03:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We are back from the 2006 Taekwondo Junior Olympics in Atlanta, GA. It was fun. We are tired.

Harley brought home a bronze medal for sparring!! WOOT!!! She did really well. We are so proud of her.

I will post pics of TKD, knitting and Atlanta when we rest up a bit.

Posted by midgeling at 12:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Getting packed sucks. I had to pack for myself and 3 kids. They are going on a road trip with Grandma, Grandpa, Uncle Nick, Uncle Tim and Nick's girlfriend Estephanie. (Or is it Estephany?) Harley, Nathan and I are going to Atlanta for the 2006 Junior Olympics. Crap. I still need to buy tickets.

"The ticketing system is unavailable due to routine maintenance."

Great.

Haven't packed my knitting yet. Okay, I got the socks in the bag. But I know I am going to need more than that. *sigh* It is 12:12 am. My plane leaves in a little over 8 hours.

Help.

Posted by midgeling at 11:20 PM | Permalink

Okay, if you can't handle some seriously non-Christian thoughts and language - stop reading right here.

Yeah. One of those days. Actually, it all started much before today. It's like I was telling Nathan earlier, I keep chanting to myself "It's just a little thing... it will pass... forget about it... things will get better."

Well, I am sick as fuck of saying that to myself. It hasn't gotten better. So I have a few things to get off my chest.

1. Jennifer. I know that you and your mother knowingly wrote me bad checks. You lied to me. You did it to get more drugs. Your mother knew about it but she's too afraid of your crazy ass to admit that she knew it to your brother and sister. So I get screwed. No, I know I will never get that money back. I just hope your crack-addicted ass rots in jail for the assault and fraud charges. I hope you never get your kids back because you don't deserve them. They are doing much better with their loser father. At least he isn't doing crack in front of them and his sister makes sure they get to school. You are one of that 8% of women who won't even pull it together for their kids. They don't even rate that high in your sorry life. They were the only good thing that ever came out of your waste of an existence. And you fucked them over in a way that no child deserves.

2. To the asshole guy in the red Volvo. I couldn't fucking turn left because of the oncoming traffic. I realize that I got to the stop sign before you, but the other people driving east and turning south had no damn stop sign. That is why I did not take my turn before you. I didn't want to get plowed into by 30 cars with the right of way. So you can go fuck yourself. Repeatedly.

3. To the woo-woo spirit guy that keeps showing up at my bedside in the middle of the night: Please say something or leave me the hell alone. You are seriously freaking out my husband and making me think that I might be finally losing it for real. I need some sleep. I really need sleep. If you won't tell me what you want, then I can't help you. And if it is about helping your damn daughter, I don't really know if I want to help. She doesn't want help and I don't have more time and energy to waste.

4. To the half-wit people at Sam's Club. Please. Is it so hard to write down the correct date? And if I am not the one who fucked things up in the first place, please spare me the look and the lecture. Go give it to your intellectually challenged coworker. And no, just because I took the sample you offered, that does not mean I am obligated to buy. Okay, so you only have 10 cases left. Thanks for the update. No - I do not need to tell you where I plan on going after I leave the store. That is none of your damn business.

5. To the man that I will not name: You are not funny. No wonder your daughter has issues. You needlessly made fun of me. I know you don't like me. I don't really like you either, but I am friends with your wife. We have friends in common. I am trying to keep the peace. Back off and I will stay civil.

6. To the bored woman in Finance: Yes, the numbers for CT for the fiscal year are off. Volumes were down for a couple of months, and higher in a couple of other normally low months. There are probably other factors, like new equipment, new clinic referrals that we didn't have before and maybe some other weirdnesses. This was all explained to you a couple of months ago. I just spent my entire damn day (and will probably continue tomorrow) to put together the rest of my comparison report with pretty charts and graphs and stuff so that you can see that there are reasons that things aren't always as you expect them to be. Verbal explainations were obviously not enough. Go pick on some other department that doesn't have to deal with $14 million a month.

7. To Rem and Wonderful: Thank you for being there for me. Thank you for being my friends. Thank you for reminding me that things get tough but we will all get through them together. Thank you for loving me even though I get cranky and sullen. I love you. Thanks for making sure I go to church when I need to.

Posted by midgeling at 09:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

We went to Coulon Park on Sunday with the kids (including Weebug's daughter Fiona). We had fun and the kids went swimming. Unfortunately, none of the pictures of the big kids swimming came out because the darn sun wasn't cooperating. It was coming from entirely the wrong direction, so all their faces were in the shadows. The sun wouldn't change direction for me and I was NOT about to swim out into the lake with the camera. So we have these 3 photos of "stuff" for today. I have an actual FO that we will laugh about tomorrow when I get a picture taken of it.

Here's Mr. Duck. He was not happy that we had no food for him.

This is Lexa terrorizing this poor squirrel. He was a bit spooked by a 3 year old shouting "Come heeere meester squirrel. I just wanna pet you for a while. I promise not to squish yooooouuuuu!" He obviously didn't believe her because he kept running.

And here is the Lucky Ladybug. (S)he is the first one I have seen so far this spring. No spots, though. I like them with spots.

Posted by midgeling at 09:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Okay, so a lot has been going on. I am at another point in my life where things aren't peachy keen. There is a lot going right, but there are a few rough spots.

"It's not about life becoming easier. It's about you becoming stronger."

Last Saturday, our dojang had a small taekwondo tournament as a fundraiser for our team. Some things had been going on with a few of the girls on the team - nothing major - but still, I wanted to stay out of it because I figured part of growing up is learning to deal with each other. But still, some of these things going on led up to a minor incident where Harley ended up feeling pretty bad about some things that were said. Many of the other parents were very supportive and expressed sympathy at what happened, so that was nice. It just left me feeling a bit sad that it all came down to that.

In the end, Harley ended up getting silver in sparring. She did very well! We were so proud of her. It was also Chace's first time sparring. And it totally figures that everyone forgot cameras. So I have a couple of little pictures from my camera phone, but nothing very high quality.

Chace is the one on the left kicking. We were so proud of how he did. We were a little nervous that he might freeze up or forget what to do. But you could tell by how he fought that he has been paying more attention to his sister and to classes than we thought.

Posted by midgeling at 10:24 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I was just remarking to the Husband last night that I think I am going to get sick of omelettes soon. I had another large one yesteray. But I cut it down to 2 eggs and cut back the amount of veggies and it was a much more manageable size. But I also used the last of the salsa.

So today's omelette had me worried. Would I even be able to eat it? It turns out that yes, I was. And quite happily too. And that was all due to the magic that is Tabasco Chipotle Sauce.

The picture you see is of my workspace at home. You see my Omelette of the Day, Tabasco, decaf lemon ginger tea (I took my decaf lemon tea from Adagio and added fresh minced ginger while steeping), and the mess that is my desk.

Next up is a photo of my Tomten Sweater. I am actually on the sleeve. After rippng it out. Twice. Because I just wasn't liking how I was joining the underarn stitches. But now it is Mostly Okay.

Posted by midgeling at 02:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Hell in a handbasket, I say. Yes, it all is there. Tidy little basket. Not at all like the rest of my life.

Knitting? Serious? Okay. Here.

Yeah. Pathetic. That pretty much sums up the extent of my knitting and other creative endeavors. My life is pretty sucky at the moment. As stress relief I have purchased 5 smudge proof, lightfast, acid free gel pens and one moleskine notebook. Not at the same time, of course. Separately. Because if I shopped according to my taste, Levenger, Borders, Kenneth Cole,Dick Blick, Botkier, Pelikan, and Elsa Peretti would have made a fortune off me already.

It beats a crazy shopping spree totalling thousands of dollars when the credit card bills arrive.

I need to post more stuff. My brain is getting clogged again. This was my night. Yes, this. Sad. Very Sad.

Posted by midgeling at 12:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I spent Christmas sick and asleep. I hope it was better for you than it was for me. Now Harley and Lexa are sick too.

Christmas Eve was nice, we spent it with family. I have a lot of Christmas knitting I got done, but pics will have to wait till after I feel better.

Posted by midgeling at 01:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I cleaned out my purse. A while back, Weebug gave me some mesh zipper pouch hings. They are great! I love stuff like that. My crap is no longer rolling around the bottom of my bag. The red one now has my essentials - lip gloss, gum, allergy eye drops, decongestant and advil. The yellow one has my sock-in-progress. I have a larger bag that fell out and is in my car that keeps the feminine stuff plus a hairbrush.

Oh, and I also finally finished that fuzzy mobius scarf. Now I need some other small project to take with me in my giant bag. Maybe I will finish off an old project or start a new one. What to do....

I got a phone call yesterday. I start work Monday - probably. I was quite happy being unemployed. Now I am going back to work for the same place. My stipulation was that there was no way on God's green earth I was going to ever report to Petey again as long as I had life left in this damn body of mine. They agreed.

Why am I doing this? I don't like working for that place. Oh, yeah. The money. My job pays pretty decently. Gideon is my new boss. He is cool. I like him. I hate Peter-the-lying-sexist-sack-of-shit. Have I said that recently? He is one of the few humans on this planet that I can say that I hate. I don't like to hate. But the venom in me toward that man is freakishly potent.

Okay, we had a Tae Kwon Do tournament last Saturday in Monroe, Oregon. Harley got bronze and kicked some impressive ass. Hopefully soon I will get to posting some pictures on my photoblog.

Posted by midgeling at 12:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Okay, I worked the fundraiser last Sunday at Seahawks Stadium (I refuse to call it Q***t Field). Wonderful, Rem, Darcy and I gave $10 in tip money to each of the 4 kids that worked, and we took the rest to have buffalo wings and beer at the Wong Dome. That was really fun.

< knit content >
Okay, do you ever have those projects that you just can't seem to finish even though you are casting off and almost done? Yeah, me too. It is a Christmas gift, I think. If I finish the cast off part in the next couple of months. Here it is in my purse, stuck next to the newspaper, tangled with a strand of sock yarn and grocery store receipt. That fuzzball has been in my purse for months now.

Please don't give me shit because I broke from tradition and succumbed to the curiosity of the novelty yarn. I admit it. I was weak. I knitted a mobius scarf from some fuzzy overpriced ball of shiny dryer lint. At least this one doesnt quite look like muppet vomit. (Um, okay - the other one I knit did. *That* mobius scarf is hiding under my bed right now with the tails still not woven in.)
< /knit content >

Okay, back to my week. Later that Sunday night, I felt like death. I spent the next 3 days sicker than poop. Nathan stayed home Tuesday to take care of things, and i pretty much slept from Monday thru Wednesday. Yesterday I went to church with all the Lee's Martial Arts families. That was fun. The kids loved it and want to go back.

I feel better today, but definitely not back to normal. I did 6 super huge loads of laundry (do you have any idea how much laundry you can fit in the mondo-sized Kenmore front loaders?!?!)

Right now, Roomba is vaccuuming my bathroom so i can scrub the floor and get ready to go buy my husband new underwear (Tommy Hilfiger boxer briefs in case anyone is interested - which is doubtful).

Aaah. Roomba is done in the bathroom. Kids are eating. Now I have to upload pictures to Sam's Club and the pick them up later today. (I hate WalMart, but Sam's is right down the street. I wish that was a Costco.) Oh, and I have to pick up 2 kids from 2 schools, get 2 kids to Tae Kwon Do class at 3 pm and then again at 6 pm, then make it to church at 7 pm for a fashion show rehersal (don't ask).

What the hell am I supposed to be making for dinner? And when am I supposed to cook it? *sigh*

Posted by midgeling at 11:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

At 8:00 this morning, we discovered we had a squatter occupying our trash can.

It is exactly 4:00 pm as I type this. It is still there. I need to take the trash out soon, but I don't want to piss it off.

Posted by midgeling at 04:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I got a request to put up a pic of the (soon-to-be) birthday girl. I can't believe she will be 4 on monday.

"While we try to teach our children all about life, our children teach us what life is all about."

Posted by midgeling at 11:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

[Insert expletives here]

Friggin Internet Explorer. I just lost mmy damn post.

I wrote about quitting my job because I was sick of Peter being a lying misogynist sack of ____, Peter freaked out and offered me the Interface Engineer job (would have come with like a $20K pay raise) and I turned it down. Chip is Peter's friend that he hired to (eventually be our manager). Chp spends roughly 40% of his day on the phone laughing and chatting away on the phone in Romanian. He is also another sexist piggy. I am so glad i am gone.

I also write about waking from a dream this morning where Dr Mann and I were in his office and he was standing there in a brown fluffy bathrobe and matching slippers telling me how Peter has screwed things up even more since I left. That was a slightly weird dream.

My car is in the shop. AC is messed up. I probably won't get it back until Wed. I have a rental now. This sucks. Now i have to return the rental to Bellevue and go get another from the place down here. If I don't it is gonna cost me doube the daily rate for what I paid the first couple of days. I hate this. If it weren't for the fact that the AC also controls the defroster, I would just say "screw it, I don't need AC." But no - I have to pay the $1200. I should just get a new car. (Yeah, right.)

It is supposed to be 87 degrees today. I don't like heat. I have to do Boy Scout Camp starting tomorrow. I have to run around after 5 Bear Scouts. I hope it goes well. I am not looking forward to being in charge of all that, though. I am sure it will be just fine. I am just stressed out.

Posted by midgeling at 12:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Okay, my job sucks. People can't decide if I should be allowed to to think and act accordigly or blindly follow directions. It seems to change, depending on the situation and people involved.

Two people I work with are fed up with the administration doing nothing about Petey's freakishness. They filed complaints with HR. I hate where I work now. I used to care about my job. Since I didn't get the business job, I have no way out from under Petey. So I really think I have to leave now. It is just a matter of when.

I have been out sick all this week, and one day last week. It has been nice not to work. Petey was out of town. He left a mess and people were pissed all over the place. I was in charge, lol! Too funny.

Petey is back and micromanaging again. He has already sent me an "urgent" email asking if I sent out a couple of reports that I was supposed to do on a weekly basis. I reminded him that I had been covering for two other positions as well as being out sick earlier this week. I told him I was behind, but busy working on everything on My List.

I spent some time chatting with some co-workers online earlier and we are all pretty miserable. I love the people i work with, but our management sucks and we all want out.

I can't wait for summer - summer with the kids will be fun! :-)

Posted by midgeling at 12:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Didn't get the BM job. For some reason I was way more relieved than disappointed. They gave it to some guy in Finance. I suppose that was a much more favorable political move for the department. I found out that the Director went against what the majority recommendation was. Interesting.

At least that takes some pressure off of me. It leaves the door open for me to have a much easier time leaving if I have to.

I really expected to be more disappointed. Aren't I supposed to be upset at all? Relief? That's not at all what I expected.

I am tired and my house is a disaster. My housekeeper woman hasn't showed like 3 weeks in a row. There is a boatload of housework for me to do and I have been working (for HMC) way too much lately.

I was supposed to meet Marti for lunch on Wed. I couldn't because Peter decided to change my interview for noon. Then he didn't show up for it. It ended up being hours later. He pulls that crap on me all the time.

Too much drama at work and far too little knitting/enjoyment for me at home.

I have a new washer. It is the Kenmore 4He. The old one died and dumped like 25 gallons of water in my basement. It smells like crap down there.

Random. It is all random.

Summer decided to come early to Seattle. The other day the normal for that time of year was 66. It ended up getting to be like 89-92 in my area. At least today it isn't supposed to be so blazing hot.

I need food. One piece of mochi doesn't quite cut it for breakfast.

Posted by midgeling at 10:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Holy crap, I am stressed out. I missed an appt with the autism specialist and the resource room teacher yesterday because I could swear that she said it was supposed to be for today.

I have to look at what to do with my older children this summer. I already signed them up for 2 weeks of tae kwon do summer camp. We have a week of vacation. I dont know what I am supposed to do the rest of the time. The community center has day camp. I hope it doesnt fill up too fast.

And I am up for another promotion at work. It could mean another 15% pay raise. Too much on my plate right now.

Posted by midgeling at 09:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

We went to Chuck's and Chace brought a couple of his friends - Bryce and his brother Casey.

I made my sister a new coat on Monday. Now I am knitting a scarf to go with it. I will have to post pics tomorrow after some of the chaos dies down.

Posted by midgeling at 10:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Tylenol Sinus: 2
Claritin: 1
Pollen count: 10.5
Midgeling misery factor: 8.5

Damn junipers.

Posted by midgeling at 09:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

This has been my day.
And these 4 pagers have been the least of my worries.

I get to take 3 of them home with me since I am on call this weekend.
I want to go home.

Knitting? Tatting? Reading?
If I am lucky. Really lucky.

Posted by midgeling at 03:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Cube, cube, oh spacious cube.
How I adore thee.
With knee room aplenty and fluorescent lighting.
Thou art the home of my laptop.

Here is the space Joy and I were sharing for a month while our office renovations were taking place. We had to cram us both into one cube.

And here is my space - my very own cubette! Lucky me. I was able to put my fountain from my MIL on my desk.

Posted by midgeling at 12:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I took the kids to tae kwon do. Chace has no uniform bottoms and Harley has no belt.

03/16/05:

"You know, because your son is autistic..."

Yeah, so my thoughts are going to be somewhat rambling and weird right now. Just be glad you aren't here with me at work, wondering why this person in your meeting is being such a freak. Okay, I only cried a couple of times so far. Not much, mostly quiet tears and a bit of sniffling.

No, my son is not dying. He does not have a serious or life threatening illness. The school psychologist intern called and we chatted a bit. She is a very nice woman, and I believe that she is good at what she does, and shows an interest in my son, as well as the other childre she has been involved with at the schools.

03/17/05:

I had a meeting at Chace's school today about his Individual Education Plan. The people at his school are great, and things are okay. I still am having a hard time wrapping my head around the fact that he has been Labeled.

I know. It is no big deal. His Apserger's isn't near as bad as it could be. He is making improvements and developing every day. But as a mother, I wast to scream and beat someone because I don't want him to have to deal with all the crap that icky people may end up throwing at him because he isn't wired like everyone else.

But screw everyone else. My son at his most odd times is a hell of a lot better behaved, smarter and sweeter than some of the "normal" or "average" kids out there. I can think of a few hellions offhand that I have seen running around that could use an ass kicking. I wouldn't change anything about Chace for all the money in the world. I couldn't ask for a better son, so I am thankful for that.

Posted by midgeling at 05:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

"WE UPPED OUR STANDARDS SO UP YOURS"

I was driving behind this truck this morning. It made the commute worthwhile.

Posted by midgeling at 09:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

One brownie. Dough. Unbaked. Need fast chocolate fix.

Sure, you can start a load of laundry while you try to nuke a brownie.

But 2 minutes is too long. The toaster oven would have been better.

Posted by midgeling at 01:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

WRATH
1. Who did you last get angry with? Anger is a weird thing. “Irritated” would make it either Nathan or the kids. “Anger” (or fury in my case) would be an equally split stream of rage aimed at our Informatics Director and Administrative Director.
2. What is your weapon of choice? A combination of a paralyzing toxin and some really painful poison that acts like human draino. If I am pissed enough to kill you, I am going to make it as horrific as possible.
3. Would you hit a member of the opposite sex? Yeah. Been there, done that.
4. How about of the same sex? Sure, as long as she is over 18.
5.Who was the last person who got really angry at you? Probably Nathan. Maybe Lexa. But she is always angry with everyone.
6.What are your pet peeves? The epidemic of stupidity and vanishing common sense.
7. Do you keep grudges, or can you let them go easily? I hold grudges for a very long time.

SLOTH
1. What is one thing you're supposed to do daily that you haven't done in a long time? Sweep the floor.
3. Where's the number 2? I flushed it yesterday.
4. Name a person you've been meaning to contact, but haven't: There are a few, but I can safely say my grandma is the person who has been on that list longest. There is a long story about issues making things difficult, those issues have nothing to do with her, but residual family crap, etc. But I don’t want to go into that.
4. What is the last lame excuse you made? “I have PMS.”
5. Have you ever watched an infomercial all the way through (one of the long ones?) Yeah. Several. The Pilates one, the one for the ladder, the rotisserie one, and several others, I am sure.
6. When was the last time you got a good workout? A couple of weeks ago. When you are fat and out of shape, a half hour of yoga can kill you.
7. How many times did you hit the snooze button on your alarm clock today? None. Nathan did that for me. He slept on my side of the bed last night.

GLUTTONY
1. What is your overpriced yuppie beverage of choice? Toffee Almond Latte from Starbucks.
2. Meat eaters: white meat or dark meat? Dark for sure.
3. What is the greatest amount of alcohol you've had in one sitting/outing/event? I haven’t a clue. I just remember the cops laughing when they found me hiding behind a washer and I honestly couldn’t remember when my birthday was.
4. Have you ever used a professional diet company? Nope.
5. Do you have an issue with your weight? Yes – it is my duty as a woman to dislike my figure and always want to look like the skinny, bony bitch on TV.
6. Do you prefer sweets, salty foods, or spicy foods? All of the above. I love food.
7. Have you ever looked at a small housepet or child and thought, "LUNCH"? Yes. My aunt’s rabbit (now deceased) ate my favorite book. I was not happy about that.

LUST
1. How many people have you seen naked (not counting movies)? I don’t know. I came from a huge family and was the oldest. I bathed a lot of kids and changed a lot of diapers. It has to be at least a couple dozen.
2. How many people have seen YOU naked (not counting physicians/family)? Hopefully only a few.
3. Where the hell is #3?
4. Have you "done it"? WTF? Yes. And I have 4 kids to remind me.
5. What is your favorite body part on a person of your gender of choice? Whatever is cleanest.

AVARICE (GREED)
1. How many credit cards do you own? I dunno – two or three, but we don’t carry balances on our cards.
2. What's your guilty pleasure store? Levenger.com. I love that place.
3. If you had $1 million, what would you do with it? Buy a house, quit my dumb job and finish school.
5. Would you accept a boring job if it meant you would make megabucks? As long as it was part time.
6. Have you ever stolen anything? Yes – my stupid friend got met o steal a package of sunflower seeds and a Snickers bar when I was in first grade. I felt so guilty I hid them under my bed and didn’t eat them. My hamster did when he escaped.
7. How many MP3s are on your hard drive? Lots. I have a couple of hard drives full.

PRIDE
1. What one thing have you done that you're most proud of? My kids.
2. Where is #2?
3. What thing would you like to accomplish in your life? I want to finish my degree.
4. Do you get annoyed by coming in second place? Yeah, but I have been getting used to it.
5. Have you ever entered a contest of skill, knowing you were of much higher skill than all the other competitors? Yes – life is one giant contest.
6. Have you ever cheated on something to get a higher score? Probably, but I can’t think of anything at the moment.
7. What did you do today that you're proud of? I didn’t tell everyone to f*ck off and die.

ENVY
1. What item (or person) of your friends would you most want to have for your own? A house. One with working appliances.
2. Who would you want to go on "Trading Spaces" with? I don’t know. I don’t really have anyone I would want to go thru my house and figure out how to make it all look good.
3. If you could look like anyone else in the world, who would you be? I don’t know. Maybe like me minus like 60 lbs.
4. Have you ever been cheated on? Yup. Hasn't everyone?
5. Have you ever wished you had a physical feature different from your own? Yeah, when I used to get teased by all the krackers for daring to look Asian, I used to wish my eyes were different. Now I say f*ck ‘em all and I look fine.
6. What inborn trait do you see in others that you wish you had for yourself? Ignorance (sometimes). Those people have no idea how stupid they are and they don’t seem to care.
7. Do you wish you'd come up with this survey? No. This is lame.
8. Finally, what is your favorite deadly sin? Gluttony. I like to eat. Makes me feel better. But being fat sucks.

Posted by midgeling at 11:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

My dear husband was concerned for my well being. He took me out of the state for the weekend. I needed to be away from work. We just got back tonight. It is Monday. I have my final paper due tonight by 11:59 pm. It is a little more than halfway done. He has also gotten me a bit buzzed. I had several half bottles of extra extra stout stuff. He knows I am an extra stout kinda gal - and that is more than just the fact that I am a chubby chick.

It is the beer (heheh, I just typed "bber" instead of beer, then corrected it.)

Damn I feel like a dumbass. I really dont want to talk about healthy organizational culture, the importance of leadership within management, and where my organization is failing miserably in both areas.

I am too buzzed to finish my damn paper. And I have to pee again. I am having flashbacks of that time I was really drunk when I took my calcuus final. That really sucked. Eh, I will write it anyway. It beats watching Teletubbies. Lexa has demanded to watch that show.

Heheh. Lexa puked all over Nathan last night in the Pig "N Pancake in Astoria Oregon last night. I had the pan fried oysters. The poor Samoan family sitting next to us were all very good sports about it. (Thanks guys!)

Hell, I needed a weekend away. Nathan didnt seem to have as good of a time as I did. I was jsut thrilled to death at geting to be OUT OF THE GREATER SEATTLE AREA FOR A WHILE!!!

I dreamed about Dr Mann. Nothing bad, just that he was being nice and I felt bad for having fits last week. I hate work sometimes.

I am still buzzed, but need to go potty and then finish this damn paper. *sigh*

Hahahaha!! Lexa just looked at me and said "Haha! Dipsy farted!"

Posted by midgeling at 07:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

A little bird told the Radiology Director that I was going to quit. Dr Mann was not happy to hear that.

This morning I had a talk with Dr Mann. He was really very nice to me, and assured me that I am valuable, I do a good job and that things are going to get better. He said he didn't want to lose me and told me that if I ever needed anything, he wanted me to come and talk to him and he would be sure things got taken care of and fixed. He said that the same applied to Joy - I told him that she is keeping me afloat these days. I could not do this job without her help.

Dr Mann is one of the main reasons I have stayed this last year. He is a good man. I have a huge amount of respect for him.

I really hope thing work out.

Posted by midgeling at 11:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Harley is too funny sometimes. Tonight we went to Sam's Club after Tae Kwon Do. On the way out to the car, Chace kept kicking at her and getting on her nerves. After daring to give her a flying side kick to the leg while hanging from the cart, she gave him another nasty look.
Me: Chace, that probably isn’t a good idea. She is bigger than you and she is also a yellow belt.
Harley: Yeah – all that plus PMS really makes that “not a good idea”.