Busy Weekend

Well, busy few days...not just the weekend. On Wednesday we had swimming lessons and Wizard of Oz rehearsal (munchkin singing scenes...no rehearsals for me yet). On opposite ends of the county, natch!

Thursday my folks arrived for a visit. I thought I was having an early dismissal, but it was only for the students. *sigh* Eventually got home and we went to Emily's piano recital. I made some incredibly awesome and easy pulled pork sandwiches and an incredibly decadent strawberry layer cake with strawberries in it and whipped cream frosting.

Friday I had to work again. Bleah. But we went to the Ocean City Boardwalk that evening. Had a nice Italian/seafood dinner and then played "Pirate Golf." I honestly can't remember the last time I had so much fun playing miniature golf. Finished the night with Kohr Bros. custard. Yum!

Saturday I hustled off before 6 a.m. *groan* to drive up to Trenton. I attended the NJEA caucus. Read as: 4 hours of Parliamentary Procedure and receiving enough paperwork to level the Great Redwoods. Seriously, I'm enough of a geek to find this sort of thing fascinating, hence my excitement at attending the National Representative Assembly in July.

Killed enough of the day Saturday that there was no point in driving all the way back home just to hop in the car again. So I stalled awhile at a Mall until it was time to meetup with the rest of the family in Camden. Em's chorale group sang at the Riversharks game. I just love minor league baseball, but was way too distracted to remember much of anything about the game. We all ran out during the 9th inning ahead of a killer thunderstorm which let loose all over us just after we got in the car.

Today was and is significantly more mellow. We had a nice Father's Day breakfast of cinnamon-vanilla French toast, thick cut bacon and chunks of fresh pineapple. (Matthew also had more strawberry cake.) Mom and Dad took off for NW-PA (with the kids!!!). We'll see them again on Saturday to get our children back from them. In the meantime....WOOOOOO!

Seriously, I love my children. I'll miss them more than once this week. But every summer we get a week of Gramma Camp, and WOOOOOO! How bizarre it is to remember what it's like to just be us. We're actually going to dinner tonight someplace they don't even have a kids menu. And it has actual cloth tablecloths and candles! And then we're going to the movies and won't have to pay for a babysitter! I'm completely beside myself with joy.

But Thursday the house will jjst feel way too quiet and I won't quite know what to do with my time. But for now...say it again with me...WOOOOOO!

--End--

Seven Years Ago

Seven years ago at roughly 9pm, Matthew James Dugan was born. Running over with joie de vivre from the moment he learned how to smile, a big kid with an even bigger heart, Matthew is our tough guy who still loves to cuddle and hug (and I hope he always will). We love you, Matthew! Happy Birthday!

Then and now ...

--End--

Love it!

Oh my gosh I just love this print so much. SO MUCH! It's a kind of I want to type everything all running together without any spaces I'm sort of feeling gushy over it LOVE feeling.

I just want to buy it (and maybe a couple of others by the same artist) and re-do Emily's entire bedroom based on it. I want to buy it and save it and have it in reserve for when she decides she no longer wants flowers on her walls and curtains and spaceships and moonscapes on her bedspread and autographed photos of astronauts hanging about.

Wouldn't it look gorgeous in a room with beigey or teal-y walls? Or better yet, beigey walls with one teal-y wall? Curtains and bedspread to match the red.

Anyway, Joe said, "no." Stinkin' practicality.

--End--

Relativity

It's amazing how things really are all relative.

We've been having septic issues. Nothing particularly odorous or nasty, but issues nonetheless. It's gotten so anything involving large quantities of water in a short period of time (read: showering, doing laundry*) was causing water to not drain out of the house, but instead wash back up the open-ended washing machine drain in the basement.

We've been dealing with this and an assortment of septic and plumbing guys for the last couple of months. Worst case scenario -- a failed leach bed requiring replacement at $7000 and up (probably "and up" as we'd be dealing with removing numerous trees and/or our above-ground pool).

So, finding out** that we likely have a second tank*** somewhere further out beyond the first one seemed like quite the revelation. We had hope again ... maybe we wouldn't have tro replace anything. Maybe we could even dig it up on our own and just pay for pumping. Maybe!

Well, Joe spent 8 hours digging holes around the first tank and found nothing...no outlet or pipe, so we had no idea where to go.

Today we brought professionals in. With a backhoe. They dug (8-feet down!) and found the pipe and followed it out to the second tank. They're pumping the second tank and installing risers, while they're at it.

All for a mere $1500. Normall $1500 would be a lot of money for us. But, when we were anticipating and trying to save for several times that amount ... we feel more than relieved. I'm absolutely thrilled. And looking forward to doing laundry, which is weird. What an exciting life I lead.

Everything's relative.

--End--

* I've made two $25+ trips to the local laundromat this month. What a lovely experience that is, let me tell you.

** by talking to a neighbor who's lived here since all of our houses were built, and watched our house go up

*** Whoa! Second tank???? Wish we'd known about that when we had the primary tank pumped two years ago. Wish we'd known about that at any point in the 8 years we've lived here!

Debuting this August

Off Broad Street Players is doing The Wizard of Oz this summer. The unofficial cast list came out yesterday. Emily has been (type-)cast as a Munchkin, and I am going to play Aunt Em*.

Yay!

The show goes up August 8, 9, 10, 14, 15, 16, and 17. (Shows at 8 p.m., except Sundays at 3 p.m.) Want to come?

--End--

* I guess when most of the cast is in the 17-21 age range, 37 qualifies as "elderly." sigh

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday, dear Nate!

What you don't know yet is this ...
even though it's your birthday ...
it's your parents who have received the real gift!
So glad you've come to them!

--End--

One-Word Meme

Received this from Lisa...each answer must be only one word.

1. Where is your cell phone? purse
2. Your significant other? Joe

3. Your hair? ordinary
4. Your mother? Sue
5. Your father? Lee
6. Your favorite thing? travel
7. Your dream last night? forgettable
8. Your favorite drink? milk
9. Your dream/goal? spoentenaity
10. The room you're in? office
11. Your hobby? yarn
12. Your fear? loneliness
13. Where do you want to be in 6 years? tenured
14. Where were you last night? sofa
15. What you're not? self-sufficient
16. Favorite muffins? oversized
17. One of your wish list items? furniture
18. Where you grew up? PA
19. The last thing you did? baked
20. What are you wearing? workout
21. Your TV? inadequate
22. Your pets? mammalian
23. Your computer? ubiquitous
24: MISSING! Does anyone know what it should be?
25. Your mood? achy
26. Missing someone? persistently
27. Your car? trouper
28. Something you're not wearing? shoes
29. Favorite store? Target
30. Your summer? brief
31. Like someone? plenty
32. Your favorite color? red
33. When is the last time you laughed? Simpsons
34. Last time you cried? fatigue
35. Who will resend this? none

--End--

Music Galore

Em has been in two recent concerts. One, with the local "Renaissance Youth Chorale" (RYC) was last Friday, and the other with her school 3rd-5th grade chorus, was Wednesday night. Be sure to check out the video all the way down the page.

Here are a few pics from the RYC concert, taken during their pre-show warmup. The group is directed by Deborah Laird (a past music teacher and current singer with the Philadelphia Orchestra) and works out of the Trinity United Methodist Church here in Millville.

And, now during the Rieck Avenue School Spring Concert:

The whole 180-member group, directed by the Fabulous Mr. Howard Raudenbush
(also Emily's piano teacher, and the accompanist for the RYC)

Short kids get the front row (not that there's anything wrong with that)

Emily and another kid (who is the tallest 4th grader in the whole group)
introduce "Old Dan Tucker"
Emily and her best friend, Jared, after the concertAnd, finally ... the video. Emily sang this song with the Renaissance Youth Chorale as part of the whole group. She's featured here in a trio during the Rieck Ave Spring Concert.
The next day at Em's piano lesson, Mr. Raudenbush couldn't stop raving about these kids and how well they blended and stayed on pitch. (forgive the wobbles, please...this was shot with my digital camera, not my camcorder)

--End--

Winding Down

Our busy, busy year is winding down. Thank goodness!

Last Friday was Emily's Chorale concert, so no more Chorale on Tuesday nights. Next Monday is the Blue & Gold Dinner, and then no more Cub Scouts. Swimming lessons (Wednesdays) and Brownies (every other Thursday) will also be wrapping up by the end of June. I'm not sure when Tap is over for Matthew, but I think it's soon. The recital (which he's not in) is coming up in the next week or so.

I have to say, I'm done. My brain and teaching enthusiasm has completely checked out. I would rather be anywhere else doing just about anything. I'm already sort of mentally working on next year's technology curriculum, what I'm going to keep, what I'm going to change, what was so completely a worthless waste of everyone's time. I'm ready to move forward, but I really am ready for a nice long summer break.

Emily auditioned last night for a local theatre company's production of The Wizard of Oz. She sand "Castle on a Cloud" from Les Miz, and did a fine job. We should hear about callbacks in the next day or so. I'm currently planning to audition, too. But, frankly, I'm terrified and I stink. I'm hoping to be the Tin Man or maybe the witch (how fun would that be?), but I'm sure if I am cast at all, I'll be a chorus member. Which is also fun, as chorus members usually have costume changes, and wearing the heavy silver or green facepaint all night would have to become a nightmare eventually.

In other news, we're having slow house drainage/septic issues which we hope won't cost thousands of dollars to fix. Also, torrential rains and sustained 50 mph winds have left my yard a complete mess of downed leaves and (alarmingly large) branches).

Finally, my Mother's Day was lovely. We didn't do anything amazingly special (Joe's mom, her finace, Pete, and our niece, Miranda, joined us for the yummy Mother's Day brunch at church and later we went out for ice cream), but Joe spent a lot of time actually talking about what I mean to him and that's a rare thing. It was awfully nice. (Oh, the kids also gave me the requisite school projects about how great I am, along with the absolutely essential potted marigold.)

--End--

Change of Scene

I'm basically just tired of looking at that old post and thinking, "I should write something one of these days." So, now it won't have the top spot anymore.

"News"

• Might have an actual buyer for at least the loveseat part of the set.
• Facebook pwns me
• Going to teach myself to crochet so I can make this blanket
• Auditioning in a couple of weeks for a local theatre production of the Wizard of Oz (working on an audition song from Avenue Q)
• Going to DC this weekend on a bunch of coach buses with the Millville Gifted & Talented kids
• We now own two gerbils
  

Later!

--End--

Trust Your Gut

A couple of weeks ago we got a sectional sofa from Joe's mom. She's moving and has decided to get new furniture for the new place. So ... we listed our old sofa and loveseat on Craigslist. No nibbles.

So, I relisted with a slight drop in price. No nibbles for awhile and then one.

Some guy (in stilted, but intelligible) English wrote that he'd have his secretary send us a certified check as soon as he received our address and that we should remove our listing as he'd be very disappointed to find the furniture sold out from under him.

I replied politely with my contact information and told him I wouldn't be unlisting, but would keep him at the top of the list and not sell anything "out from under him."

No response for a week.

I nudged him the other day, "When should I expect the check?" He said he hadn't received my contact information, which I then resent.

He replied very quickly with thank and said he'd be sending a check for the full amount, plus some extra which we should then wire on to his mover, and that he was adding in another $50 for us for the trouble.

Hmmm... Made me feel weird. But I didn't want to be cross-culturally rude or ignorant, so I replied politely along the lines of, "I'm not comfortable with this. You should send your own money to the mover. This is highly unusual, and I prefer not to work this way."

He responded that he'd already sent the check.

Wha? "How much is this all going to be? What's the real deal?" was the jist of my reply.

$3,800

Yes, $3,800 for a $450 used sofa and loveseat set.

At this point I ran the whole situation by Joe. As I felt the whole thing was more than somewhat suspicious. I asked him to take it over. That I clearly wasn't being firm enough and that after all these emails back and forth, well, I wanted another voice to be heard. A male one. As this other guy was sort of being odd, and I wanted to remove the possibility of a gender factor.

Joe was immediately concerned. He got the guy to send us the name and address of who we were supposed to wire the additional money to. And a good thing, too.

Seems there's a somewhat uncommon, but not unheard of, Internet scam where just this sort of thing occurs. So, we've now called off the deal, and reported this guy
to various Internet fraud agencies.

I should never have let it go this far. But, maybe by getting a name and address out of him, we can help provide evidence in shutting him down.

Trust your gut. If it seems weird in an uncomfortable way...trust that. In any situation.

--End--

All Publicity is Good

We had a reporter and photographer from the local Bridgeton News visit our dinner on Sunday. A nice big color photo graced the front page yesterday (above the fold!), accompanied by the following article.

We raised over $2000 at the dinner, due largely to Chinese auction ticket sales and silent auction bids. But, sadly, we had a lot of food left-over at the end of the night. We're working on that.

Not sure how much we're going to give each team member, yet. Three of us are well on our way toward the required $2,200, and three of us have $0 so far. So, I dunno if it'll be an even split or not.

In any case, we have a yard sale coming up this Saturday, a Poker Night on May 9 (we've frozen some beef so we can sell sandwiches as well as make our cut from the pot), we're selling adorable and yummy raspberry-lemonade candles, and we have a (donated) moonbounce we can sell tickets to at the Millville Summer Fest on July 12. With under $600 to go, myself, I'm not worried about making my personal goal. But, we're really trying to work so the whole team benefits and achieves our total team requirement.

--End--

Big Day

Been prepping for a few months and especially this past week for our Breast Cancer 3-Day Beef & Beer Dinner.

Today from 3-7 p.m. we will hopefully make tons of money toward our team's fund-raising goals. The "Blister Sisters" have to raise another $8,400 before the event. And as we want to spend the summer focusing on our training ... we want to take care of the money stuff as soon as we can.

Anyway, I'll be spending the day haranguing people into buying Chinese auction tickets and 50-50 tickets. It's all for a good cause, right?

--Heidi

Happy Birthday to Me!

My co-workers gave me one of those "Year You Were Born" birthday cards, and I have to say ... 1971 wasn't all-in-all the best of times.

To wit:

• Television ads for cigarettes are banned. (yay!)


• Charles Manson and 3 followers found guilty. (boo!)


• Nixon installs secret recording system in the White House. (boo!)


• "All in the Family" debuts. (yay!)


• George C. Scott refuses his Oscar for Patton, claiming actors should not compete. (yay!)


• The New York Times begins publishing the secret Vietnam War Pentagon Papers. (erm...)


• AT&T and Bell Labs tests the first cell phone technology. (I feel old.)


• AMTRAK begins service. (really? thought AMTRAK much older, somehow.)


• Four-day Attica riots results in 43 deaths. (boo!)


• Bretton Woods agreement collapses under weight of the U.S. deficit. (what goes around, comes around)


• Dollar goes off the gold standard and devalues by 7.9%. (boo!)


• Hunter S. Thompson writes Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. (never read it, missed the movie)


• Scientists first warn of nitrogen causing serious damage to the ozone layer. (BOO!)


• The first Starbucks opens. (yay!)

Also born in 1971: Ewan McGregor and Winona Ryder (knew about them), Tupac Shakur, Jeff Gordon, Kristi Yamaguchi (thought she was younger), and Lance Armstrong (though he was way older).

(not on the card, but found easily on the Net) Also born on April 21: Robert Smith, Iggy Pop, Andie McDowell, Tony Danza, Charles Grodin, Elizabeth II, Anthony Quinn, Charlotte Bronte, Catherine the Great

--End--

Weird and Innovative and ... Sympathetic

I don't know what makes me both sort of get icked out by this and want to sort of hug it at the same time, but here it is ... an truly inventive and amazing and yet somehow loveable and still creepy robot critter thing.



--End--

Here Come de Fuzz

Only just got over to the second of my two teaching jobs. And I'm told the State Police are on their way over.

Wha?

Apparently, the school nurse found a wax-paper/cellophane type bag/packet containing a suspicious white powder. It was just lying on the ground under the window of the girls' bathroom. So, now there has to be some sort of investigation.

*sigh*

The hope is that it was inadvertently left last night by a local citizen. School Board polls were open here in the building until 9pm yesterday.

I know what pot smells (and looks) like, but I'm not sure I'd know cocaine from baking powder if given the chance. I just Googled some images and have discovered that crack looks kind of light maple sugar chunks. Cocaine looks like clumpy baking soda. And, heroin looks like, well, dirt.

I have no idea if the students have picked up on the scuttlebutt or not. Guess I'll find out when my prep period ends and the 7th (and later 8th) graders arrive. If there are any students aware, it'd be them.

--End--

No News is No News

Random Monday wanderings:

We got a "new" sectional for our family room on Friday. It's really Joe's mom's old one from her rec room. She's moving and isn't moving it. It's in great shape and is a big step up from the old sofa and loveseat we had (which are waiting for nibbles on CraigsList).

Our basement keeps flooding. Not like inches of water across the entire floor or anything, but several gallons each time we use any substantial amount of water (like two showers back-to-back, or a shower and a load of laundry). It has been raining around here quite a lot. 3+ inches just in April. Our water table is usually quite high. I mean, my house is only about 15 feet about sea level. So at this time of year, the very thin, sandy soil is about as saturated as it can get. When we dump a lot of water into our sepctic system, the water already out there in the world pushes back on it. Stuff is draining, sure, but it's sloooow. Very slow. So, water ends up backing up through the large drainpipe in the basement and gushing out the top of the washing machine drain pipe, which is open at the top. It's the lowest point of opening in the house. (Oh, some water seems to be squeezing/dripping in at the wall, as well...which is also worrisome, as we don't know if it's a re-tarring the outer wall problem, or a leak in the pipe problem.)

So I spent $24 at the local laundromat yesterday washing and very-partially-drying all of our laundry (probably about 8 regular laundery loads).

We also went to see a local high school production of Guys and Dolls, visited the local zoo, attended our best family friends daughter's first communion, and saw Joe sings a capella with the group he's in (the Cumberlads, for anyone keeping score at home).

This next weekend the Brownies have "Pirate Camp." I'll be running a raingutter regatta. Woo!

--End--

Feeling a Call

I'm feeling a call to action. I don't know if it's due to the current politically-charged atmosphere or what. Maybe it's something in the water. Maybe it's my two daily 25-minute NPR-fueled commutes. Maybe it's just the right stage in my life to do something.

I have two great kids with whom I am conscienctiously involved. I'm already a teacher and Cub Scout leader. I'll be a Girl Scout leader come the fall. I deliver Children's Messages at church. I walk 60 miles each October to help cure breast cancer. I recycle, use fluorescent lightbulbs and do almost all my shopping at Goodwill. How more can I positively impact the future?

I dunno. But I want to. I want to change things, improve things. Make a difference.

I'm seriously considering running for public office or something.

Joe doesn't know any of this, yet.

I've literally just printed out the Millville City Commission meeting schedule. The next meeting is April 15. I'm so there.

--End--

A Post About Not Posting

Yeah, I've had nothing really to say. But that's not it.

Yeah, I've been busy. But that's not it.

Mostly I've just been blah. Joe claims I do this every year at about this time. All I know is this -- my allergies are fogging my brain, the rainy/hazy weather is fogging my mood and I'm just generally ready for June. Strictly speaking, I know my mood/outlook will pick up shortly. Right now I'm worn out and there's a whole 'nother marking period looming ahead of us, so ...not so much light at the end of the tunnel, as it were.

--Heidi

Texas-sized Photo Post

Pictures from Texas ... I have over 100 I've kept and PhotoShopped to the beautiful creations you see here. I've uploaded the lot of them to the Picasa Albums, but you can see some highlights by scrolling down...

down...and down some more.

Enjoy!

--End--

ps. Jonny was doing a school science project -- a PowerPoint presentation featuring at least 40 different varieties of flower. I had fun showing him my camera's macro feature and then he used the camera throughout our visit to the Fort Worth Botanic Gardens. Some of the pics in the Flora Album were taken here in SoJo, but most are from our trip. I'm enjoying taking close-ups, so there will be more additions to this album, for sure.