This looks like a faked and staged picture. It’s not! Here’s Alaska, my niece, at the 14,100 foot summit of Pike’s Peak this past Christmas Eve! It was coooooold up there!
Alaska – the person, not the place!, originally uploaded by Blah Blah Blog.
Monthly Archives: December 2006
EyeSicles
I prayed for a white Christmas since many of my family were visiting Colorado Springs for the holidays! We got lots of snow, as you know, if you’ve been watching the news at all! I’m not saying MY prayers were answered, I’m just saying, my Christmas was very white.
And nobody was more happy about that than me, except for Mitchell! Mitchell is my four (five in February) year old nephew, and he was in pig heaven with all that snow in which to wallow! We decided to take the cog railway up Pike’s Peak on the afternoon of Christmas Eve. When we left the depot in Manitou Springs it was a bright and sunny day. The temperature was balmy, and in the 40′s! The mountain was clear and we anticipated amazing views from the peak as there wasn’t a cloud in sight!
As we chugged up the mountain, the mist settled in. The temperatures dropped. As we neared the summit, we could barely see thirty feet out the windows as the snow started. Never did you see more excitement than Mitchell, seeing it snow for the first time, as he yelled out “Guys! Guys! It’s SNOWING!!!”.
With the conductor’s warning of not wandering off and not being late returning to the train as we would NOT be waited for NOR looked for (he said, “we’ll leave without you, and instead of being a passenger, you’ll be a hiker!”) ringing in our ears, we stepped off the train.
And the breath was nearly sucked from our lungs! It was COOOOOOLD! Twenty below! The winds whipped the summit, and everything else in its path at 45+ mph! It was glorious! Mitchell was running around and having an absolulte ball. After a few minutes I saw that he’d become a little bit frosty. Here’s Mitchell, with pure joy on his face, sharing his eyesicles with us. If you look closely you can see his sweat frozen to his face as well!
EyeSicles, originally uploaded by Blah Blah Blog.
We ate “high altitutude donuts” (yum) and we smashed pennies. And we huddled inside our inadequate clothing. And we discussed the fact that we were probably no more than about 15 minutes from certain death. And we laughed. There was no view to be had! And when we returned to the lower altitudues, the snow continued despite there being no snow in the forecast. What a gift. I say, let’s do it again next year!
Happy Birthday To Me!!
It’s not exactly fathomable to me that yet another year has passed. Today my calendar starts anew, and a few days later, the world’s calendar will start anew. That’s a lot of “anewness” in a short period of time, isn’t it?
And yes, I’m 29….
….again.
It’s That Time of Year Again!
You’ve probably all seen these before, but it’s time to bring them out and dust them off, and watch and listen again! (I am somewhat envious of these efforts. I myself have been unable to yet locate the five strands of colored lights I have for my four foot tall fake tree!)
I’m Sorry, You Have WHAT?
She was probably in her late 30′s, if I remember correctly. She came into the emergency department complaining of “fireballs of the eucharist”.
I knew she thought she was saying something that she really had. I didn’t even let on that I was cracking up inside! So, after asking a few very pointed questions, I was able to get down to the issue at hand…..
me – “Do fireballs of the eucharist hurt?”
her – “Yes.”
me – “Where do they hurt?”
her – “In my stomach.” (and she indicated her lower abdomen)
me – “Have you ever had surgery for this?”
her – “Yes.”
me – “What kind of surgery?”
her – “They cut some of the fireballs out of my eucharist, but they left my eucharist, so I can still have kids.”
Now it was clear…
She had fibroids of the uterus.
Being an ER nurse is kind of like being a detective sometimes.
Emergency Roomism for the day:
Fireballs of the Eucharist = Uterine Fibroids
Apples to Apples
Have you ever played this game? Tonight was my “small group” Christmas dinner. A small group is like a mini-church, just FYI. There are about fifteen people from my big church that attend this small group. And we were all able to sit around the table after dinner and play this easily. It doesn’t require a lot of smarts, but it helps to have a handle on the people you’re playing with. You might be able to get them to pick the card you submit for a category as the best one if you know what you think they might lean towards picking!
I’d never heard of it before. But I think I’ll get it for when my family is out here. We like to play games, but even Diana G. liked it, and she HATES games! 
Click HERE for more information
Christmas Lists
It’s that time again! I put my request out from my nieces and nephews to send me their wish lists. Today in the mail I received Avalon’s and Mitchell’s, all nicely typed in a cute font in bright colors! Mitchell has a couple of items that are very, well, hmmmmmmmm, what are they? The most interesting one is number 10. He wants a “Candle”. A candle??? He’s not even five! What does he want a candle for? He also has asked for “Two boats”. Not one. Two. I do sometimes wish I was inside his head.
Which reminds me that I need to digress before I forget to tell you a story about being inside Mitchell’s head. This story was told to me by my sister Diane and my mom told it to her. Mitchell was in my mom’s car tearing up a styrofoam cup. Apparently my mom asked him why he would do that, or something to that affect. His answer went something like this…”My brain tells me to these things.” Now, tell me that this isn’t evidence of a sin nature! Okay, back to Christmas Lists!
Both kids have 11 items on their list. Number 4 on Mitchell’s, and number 2 on Avalon’s is something called “Floam”. Are you familiar with this stuff? (Official Floam Website) It looks like something that would get into all kinds of places you don’t want it and you’d never get it out. It has been on the last few years’ Christmas lists. We’ve been forbidden to buy it for them, but they keep on asking! Sorry kids! NO FLOAM FOR YOU!! (a la the Soup Nazi, you know?)
My favorite thing on Avie’s list is number 6. “Kiss from Daddy”. This is particularly cute, because my brother just lavishes his kisses on her all the time. It’s not like she is in a kiss deficit where her Daddy is concerned!
Kids are cute!
Now, I am off to buy two boats. And maybe an Easy Bake oven! (That’s number 9 on Avie’s list. But I’m surprised it’s not on Mitchell’s, too!)
Where’s Peter?
My Mom’s cousin’s son is named Peter. (That makes him my second cousin). He’s way cool. He’s an adventurer and a traveler. I wish I could go on all his trips with him. He lives on a boat. He’s in Cambodia as of today. He has finally started a blog. I just learned about it today, but it dates back to the beginning of this particular adventure. I didn’t ask him if it was okay to publish his blog’s address, but I did a blog search and found it, so it’s public. I figured that made it okay! I know that a lot of my family, and Peter’s family, reads my blog, and that they might really be interested in where on earth Peter is and what on earth Peter is doing!! So I have added him to my blogroll. But here’s a link, for your current convenience!
He includes links to some pretty amazing photos that he has taken along the way. If you appreciate good pictures, check out Peter’s Flickr site.
Blog Theft: “O Holy Cow”
Oh my. Do I have a song for you! Not mine, mind you! I only WISH I had come across this gem. I stole it from darrowart.com. David Darrow (if you have time check out his art work at www.darrowart.com, do so) originally published this in his blog on January 18th. I thought it was time to dust it off and share it with you! I don’t know where David got it, but I understand that it was actually an audition tape!
Click here!!! You won’t be sorry!
Have Kleenex ready, and don’t stop listening! You might at first think, “well, that’s not SO bad, I’ve heard worse.” You will not hear worse, ever, not even on American Idol, if you listen all the way to the end. The Kleenex is for your tears of laughter, and for your bleeding eardrums.
I don’t know what the rules are for pimping other people’s blogs. I’m sure some sort of i-police will be knocking on my door for having done this! I e-mailed and asked permission, but never got a reply, so I figure I’m probably okay! (I even stole the name of his posting!)
And remember, listen all the way to the very end!!!
Mew Ling’s Mewsings
Well, you know it had to happen some time. The other night while I was reading some of my favorite blogs I came across one that sparked Mew Ling’s interest. This blogger’s cat also had a blog. Mew decided she just had to have her own blog as well. So she got one. She’s on my blogroll, but here’s a link for you for today!
Check it out! Her latest post is pretty good. For a cat. (Don’t tell HER I said that!)
