How do you feel today?

[Avatar]

Thanks guys. I'll pass on your best wishes and sympathies.

And yeah SD, I must say, my faith in my country's postal system has been almost fully restored over recent years. My thanks to you too.

--A

[aliantha]

Speaking of the postal system, I should share with y'all the final installment in the mail-order prescription snafu. You may recall that Walgreens called me a week ago yesterday, all put out because I hadn't picked up the tide-you-over prescription yet. They said the refill was "all ready to go," but I had to pick up the tide-you-over prescription first. So I walked six blocks in 95-degree heat to pick up that five-pill prescription, and six blocks back. Remember that part?

Well, it turns out that the refill was *so* "all ready to go" on Monday that they didn't give it to Fedex 'til Friday. Needless to say, they didn't pay for Saturday delivery, and of course yesterday was a holiday, so the emergency refill arrived...today.

It's a *really* good thing the forwarded package showed up last Tuesday....

I am debating whether to e-mail them another complaint. I doubt I'll get anything more than a "we're really sorry", so I'm not sure there's much point.

Anyway, right now I am feeling minty fresh. I realized a couple of weeks ago that the silver picture frame on my desk at work was severely tarnished. So I brought it home and have been working on it tonight with toothpaste. The tarnish is coming off, but the apartment now reeks of Crest Pro-Choice.

[Cameraman Jenn]

I'm tired. Had a great weekend up in Oregon. The wedding was gorgeous. It was on private riverside property up in Sweet Home. The groom's parent's place. Everyone looked gorgeous. I took almost 1400 pictures. I tried loading them into my computer last night and it kept timing out so I divvied it into chunks and have been loading it in and had one last chunk to do tonight and I was doing it and got a weird message that the files were not in a recognizable/supported format. I wigged out then realized my camera battery had died. Luckily I always have a spare on the charger so I am loading the final batch now. I also took a bunch of flower shots and nature shots from my Mom's yard. I stayed with my Mom and Steve (Stepdad) during the time I wasn't at the wedding. We had a nice 4th day celebration with burgers on the grill and potato salad, grilled corn on the cob and baked cauliflower with cherry ice cream with fresh cherries and shaved dark chocolate on top for dessert. We watched a medley of bad horror films on the free movies from on demand. "Blood Surf," "May," and "The Dark Half" amongst them.

Wildlife spotting included grey squirrels, douglas squirrels, common tree squirrels, scrub jays, several varieties of hummingbirds, many deer of various ages and sexes including a velvet stub buck who seems to be living under the deck, wild turkeys of several ages and sexes, crows, sparrows, woodpeckers, raccoons of various ages and several other bird varieties I don't know the names of. I got a bunch of pics of the aforementioned but I probably won't post them until I get finished weeding through the wedding sets.

I was back at work today and I got a nice compliment from one of my cashiers. When she came on shift today and saw me she said, "I'm so glad you are back. I missed you." I laughed and said, "Thanks!" She followed up with, "I like working with you the best because you always respond right away and you make it so much easier." I looked at her and said, "I know what you mean, I hate asking someone to get something or to backup and I get silence and no help and then you get stuck with a customer getting more and more impatient. I hate that." She was just like, EXACTLY!

[aliantha]

Glad you're back and that you had a good weekend, Jenn.

[Krazy Kat]

It's been all housework this week. I'd fallen behind so I had lots more jobs than usual: vacuuming, dusting and polishing, washing windows, laundering chair and cushion covers, sorting through heaps of stuff, what to keep, what to chuck out, what to give to the charity shop, oiling squeaky door hinges, then moving around the furniture and setting up my PC in the other room.

We've been enjoying a long, long, spell of warm sunny weather, but today it broke, totally overcast with grey dirty clouds scudding across the sky. The temperature hasn't dropped a great deal but I've been feelingl really drowsy all through the day.

I found some old notebooks from my creative writing days and have spent hours sunk in an armchair reading through them. I was surprised to find several 300 word stories that I'd completely forgotten all about, although they are mainly ideas for larger pieces of work.
The notebooks are also handmade. I use to enjoy folding A4 paper into sections, stitching them up with needle and thread, then glueing the sections together with G-clamps into their spine and back covers. The notebooks are about 10 years old and still holding together quite well.

Anyway, too drowsy to write more...

[Sorus]

Welcome back, Jenn - sounds like a fun trip.

Miss you soo much. This week so far, our cashier has been MIA, and the managers think she might have told them she was going on vacation. They can't remember, and aren't very concerned about it, since they aren't the ones having to do her work. And things besides that are generally... bad and getting worse. Am not going to go off on a full rant, but I am so tired and stressed out and frustrated right now.

[Cameraman Jenn]

Thanks everyone for the welcome back. KK, that's cool about your stories and is that a MTG card you are sporting for an avatar????!!!!?????

Sorus, I told your leader at least three times that I would be back on Monday night and at work on Tuesday and yet he still apparently stopped by my new store on Monday to unload his drama on me. I wasn't there. If it's any consolation, I hear he's sporting a black eye and got sucker punched while in Vegas over the weekend. I think he was expecting sympathy when he told me on the phone but I laughed. Then I dished up some extremely insincere sympathy when he whined about it. Then he was whining about something else and I had to say, "I told you exactly what to do and you didn't listen." and he said, "I know, I knew you were going to say I told you so and yet I had to let you say it anyway. You were right. I hate that. Now give me some sympathy." Tomorrow I am coming into your store briefly to get some crap I need to work on a project and to hear first hand some more whinging. It's the trade off for getting the parts I need. On another level, it's a bit gratifying to learn that his realization that when I told him a month ago, if he took path A then 1, 2, 3 and 4 would result and he would be faced with path B by force and NOT by choice, was completely dead on. It was creepy to learn that he was agonizing over it during his morning shower, how to tell me I was right over and over on the matter. Not so sure I like being the subject of that particular male's shower contemplation even if it is only his agony over having to hang his head in shame.

Anyway, I'm loading some pics on the photography thread now. Hope you all enjoy.

Here's a teaser:

[Krazy Kat]

is that a MTG card you are sporting for an avatar????!!!!?????

When I read in this month's GI about Stephen Donaldson's thoughts on the cover art for AATE I thought how cool it would be to have Chronicles trading cards. I was googling to see what trading cards there were and found Magic Deck Vortex pictures. I of course did some jiggery-pokery on PhotoPlus, just for fun.

I'm putting back my usual avatar and later will post pictures and a brief explanation of Why I Like My Avatar in the Photography Thread, just as a way of letting you know a little bit more about myself.

You're pictures are super-fab by the way... I had a grey squirrel living in the tree in my garden, but I havn't seen the critter this year. Maybe he moved out and went to live in another drey. I'll miss him, he was a good whistler!

[Avatar]

Hey, wait a second...there are Chronicles MTG cards (or something).

Ask Fist, he'll know...

--A

[Krazy Kat]

[Spiral Jacobs]

I'm in a kind of limbo. Last Wednesday, June 30, my beautiful daughter was born . She's absolutely gorgeous and perfect and everything.

Two days later, however, my son, who's turning 3 in August, broke his left femur in an weird fall in day care. He's been with his legs in traction for a week now, and I've spent most of my time with him in the hospital. He'll probably be there for another week.
I go home whenever I get the chance, but I'm not leaving him alone, so life is a bit weird at the moment. There's no individual days in hospitals. We're a split family and it hurts , especially at this time.

[Menolly]

Mazel Tov on the birth of your daughter, Spiral Jacobs, and "feel well soon" to your little man.

Hang in there.

[lucimay]

I'm at the Prom and having a good time [ie: not the prom as in a dance...I mean Wilsons Promontory national park. ]

are you still at the Prom? i hope you're having a good time!!!
i wish i was at the Prom with you!!! we'd dance all night!! (j/k)

miss you bublita. hugs and smooches!!

[aliantha]

<ali strives mightily to restrain herself from pointing out that Sea gets "hugs and smooches" from Luci while the rest of us get "hugs and shit" >

SJ: Congrats on the baby and hugs for the whole family:

[lucimay]

<ali strives mightily to restrain herself from pointing out that Sea gets "hugs and smooches" from Luci while the rest of us get "hugs and shit" >

SJ: Congrats on the baby and hugs for the whole family:

don't worry ali, i give her shit too!! when i think of it!

oh and ditto on the baby grats Spiral!!

[Damelon]

Congratulations on your daughter, SJ, and hope your son gets better soon. He'll be ok. My niece broke her femur when she maybe 2 1/2 hopping around on the couch. On Monday, she will turn 21. Where does the time go?

I had a nice few days up in Wisconsin, where I stayed at my grandmother's old place in Door County. It's right beside Green Bay, with the bedroom window about thirty feet from the water. Mani liked it, but came away with a slight "ocean" scent - not the scent that they advertise on shampoo, but the one like seaweed rotting. I wonder if he found something to roll in when I wasn't watching. In any case, I returned Wednesday night. I had intended to go down to Chicago to wander around, but it wouldn't be a vacation for me without doing something to foul things up and this was no exception. While unloading the car, I tweaked my back. So, for the last couple of days, I've been hobbling around hunched over. Walking about was out of the question, so I've spent the last day alternating between watching the History and Cooking channels.

[aliantha]

Feel better soon, Damelon! This is *not* recommended way to extend your vacation...

[danlo]

Congrats Spiral! Rough go High Lord! You've convinced me to leave the house right now and get a chair massage. Update on my leg: It still looks nasty, but is healing nicely-Wound Care put a week-long 'semi-cast" on it to keep the swelling down and also gave me a specialized sandal. I can't tell you how much pressure that took off my left leg (compensating) and now I walk normally... It's Friday: yea!

[Fire Daughter]

Summer is in full swing up here on the Mountain. We had our annual 4th of July BBQ in which pretty much all the HIV/AIDS patients and families are invited too. Mom would have wanted us to continue doing these things. We had about 50 people this year. It was alot of work but alot of fun.

Myles and my brothers, Jordan, Ryan, Micah and Tristan are all helping with a Habitat for Humanity house down in Bend this summer. So they are keeping busy. The little ones keep my sisters and I hopping around. And the weather is finally NICE!

So, as Mom used to say..."Life goes on." We sure do miss her, but she now lives in our hearts.

[Avatar]

So, as Mom used to say..."Life goes on." We sure do miss her, but she now lives in our hearts.

It does. And she always will.

--A