22 X 2

It’s an odd favorite number, but it’s mine.  Been mine for a looooong time, but not as long as it’s been Hollister’s favorite number, in that Hollister was “established” in 1922. 

I have a bunch of original “22″ pictures, but they are all still stuck on my old computer with most of my picture files.  So I borrowed one!

Today was my 44th birthday!  (More technically, it’s the 22nd anniversary of my 22nd birthday!)  It was a great day from start to finish!

My little bro (Low, in from out of town) and nephew Mitchell drove up to the mountains to spend the day.  To the spectacular ski resort of Breckenridge to be precise.  Our goal?  Find snow to play in and take pictures.  We succeeded at both of those, and also I got to see Sarah from my Zambia 2006 team!!!  She was also in from out of town working as a nanny of sorts for a family who were there for the holidays.  I was so excited to see her (our visit lasted about 20 minutes!) that I forgot to take a picture!  BUT I do have some pictures of playing in the snow!

 

We found a baseball field that was, at least until we got to it, untouched!  It was about 18 inches deep in fluffy white snow.  Low took a few flying leaps into it, and he also tossed Mitchell into it a few times.  I of course had to take one of my world famous (hahahahaha) foot pictures which was actually more of a leg picture!

During our drive up to the slopes my car hit a paricularly slick spot in the road.  I couldn’t get past it and I had to break out my chains for the very first time since moving to Colorado!  And on a beautiful warm and sunny day of all times!  My sweet brother Low slapped them on my tires and we made it the last 100 feet up the hill!

Back at home we met up with family and friends for a great Mexican dinner with my favorite cake for dessert (chocolate chocolate chip with powdered sugar) and presents!  One of my best birthdays ever.  Only I ate too much, and now I think I should go to bed and sleep off too much fun and too much food!  Thanks to everyone who helped make this a most memorable birthday!

Happy Birthday to me!

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“Spider” – A Short Movie

I saw this posted on one of the ER doctor blogs I regularly read.  It’s freaky.  Watch it if you dare.  And remember, it’s not real, it’s a movie!!!!!

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Snowveralls

I gave my nephew Mitchell a pair of snow overalls (what I call “snowveralls”) for Christmas.  When he opened them up and pulled them from the box, his mom asked him if he knew what they were. 

 Almost without hesitation he nearly shouted…  “OVARIES!”.

True story.  I was there!

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Joy to the World

Joy to the world! the Lord is come;
Let earth receive her King;
Let every heart prepare Him room,
and heaven and nature sing,
and heaven and nature sing,
and heaven, and heaven and nature sing.

Joy to the earth! the Savior reigns;
Let men their songs employ;
while fields and floods,
rocks, hills and plains
Repeat the sounding joy,
Repeat the sounding joy,
Repeat, repeat the sounding joy.

No more let sins and sorrows grow,
nor thorns infest the ground;
He comes to make His blessing flow
far as the curse is found,
far as the curse is found,
far as, far as the curse is found.

He rules the world with truth and grace,
and makes the nations prove
the glories of His righteousness,
and wonders of His love,
and wonders of His love,
and wonders, wonders of His love.

Joy and peace be to you as we celebrate the birth of the savior, Jesus Christ.

Merry Christmas!

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One More Cent…

All the things I could be, and perhaps SHOULD be blogging about, and I am doing the gasoline thing AGAIN! 

I heard on the news tonight that the cheapest gas can be bought in Cheyenne, Wyoming, for $1.37.  The gas at my favorite gas station was $1.40 today.  One more cent and it’ll be under $1.40.  And I won’t have to drive up to Cheyenne to get it!  I still have a quarter of tank left from the last fill-up which cost me $1.64/gallon. 

Just how low will it go?  Seems like only months ago I was wondering just how high it would get. 

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The Wind She Is A Blowin’

It’s only gusting at 40 mph, but sitting in my living room it sounds like the shingles are blowing off the roof.

I hope the wind is going to blow in a lovely snowstorm for the weekend…although I hope for a good snow, it could keep me from getting out and finishing my shopping list.

It’s the 18th of December.  Christmas is less than a week away.  I have not only not wrapped, packed, and mailed my gifts for those afar off, but I haven’t even finished shopping for them, let alone for those who live locally.  No Christmas cards this year.  No decorations up either (although I am choosing to not decorate this year because my new kitten has few manners yet and would be chewing on lights, batting ornaments off the tree, maybe trying to climb the tree…I wouldn’t have the time even if I was going to decorate).  Not a single Christmas treat baked.  How on earth did I get so far behind this year?  I thought I was unprepared for Christmas last year, but this year is my personal best at excellent lack of planning! 

I have tomorrow and the weekend and that’s it.  I work the 22nd, 23rd, and 24th, all day long!  Now, I am off to try to get the gifts I do have wrapped and ready to go!  I think I’ll have to lock the cats in a room to keep them from “helping”.

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Chico and Grass Valley

Kari and Michael are Ian and Colin’s parents.  Ian was “one of my kids” on my mission trip to Sicily in 2007.  Colin is Ian’s little brother.  I love the boys and they let me, which is pretty cool, cuz I’m just an old lady.

This week I got to meet their parents, who live in Chico.  The ladies on my mom’s side of the family get together every December for a shopping trip.  This year we met up in Grass Valley.  Kari and I, who have become friends without actually meeting in person, have been wanting to meet, and they live “sort of close” to Grass Valley, so I extended the trip a bit and planned on making that happen.

I flew into Sacramento and was very glad that I hadn’t checked any bags because I don’t think I would have been able to find it in piles of luggage in the baggage claim area! 

I retrieved my rental car (a Ford Focus which got nearly 34 mpg, btw) and had the most lovely and serene drive from the airport there to Chico.  This sunset was happening out my driver’s side window.  The smell of freshly turned earth was in my nose.  The mist was settling into the valleys and around the hills.  Geese, swans, and heron were settling in for the night in various water filled rice fields.  The grass was emerald green between the groves of fruit and nut trees.  It was one of the most nearly perfect drives I have ever taken.  It was too dark for pictures, but the sunset made it all magical.

Kari and Michael?  Love them.  I stayed with them before going to Grass Valley for the weekend.  I drove out to Grass Valley and pulled up to where I would spend the next two days…a beautifully restored victorian home, A Victorian Rose.  There I met up with my mom, my aunt Leslie, my aunt Lynne, my cousins Jane and Jeannie, Jane’s mother-in-law Norma, and an old family friend Susie.  We spent time together, laughed together, dined together, and shopped together.  We had the house to ourselves and we made ourselves at home.

My Mom, Jeannie, Jane, Norma, Leslie, Susie and Lynne enjoying dinner together

We left there on Sunday morning with a light snow falling.  Perfect.  I returned to Michael and Kari’s to spend more time getting to know them and fellowshipping with them.

 Michael, Me, and Kari in Bidwell Park by the redwoods

Good times with family.  Good times with new friends.  But it’s always good to get back home, isn’t it?

Thanks to all for making this trip a wonderful one.  And thanks to Vickie for taking care of “my girls”, Mew Ling and Lu Na, once again.

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Photo Friday – “Christmas Lights”

Today’s Photo Friday challenge sends us in search of Christmas Lights.  I looked on my hard drive and found this. 

I would like to play more with lights in motion in the future.  This is a very monochromatic look and would like to see what I could capture with multiple colored lights.

Don’t forget to Mr. Linky your entry if you are playing.  Please visit the other players sites and tell them what you think of their entries this week!

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Claustrophobia

One of the aspects of one of my jobs is to give sedation (either oral or intravenous) to clients who need MRIs but who suffer from claustrophobia (fear of being in enclosed spaces) and need the bravery that the meds can give them.  Some folks break into a sweat just looking at the “tube” and imagining being in it.  Others are fine until they are slid inside.  Some are so freaked out once they get inside that they Houdini themselves out before we can get to them to help them out!  Despite reassurances that they can’t help the irrational fight or flight response that has been elicited, they often they voice embarassment at their inability to control the fear that wells up inside of them.

Before their exam, I usually ask them if they know why they have claustrophobia.  Oddly, it is the rare woman who knows the reason.  Much more often men can pinpoint the genesis of their fear of being in the MRI “tube” to a particular event.  (Of note, people will sometimes not know that they have claustrophobia until they try to have an MRI and fail!)

Here are some of the stories I have heard from male patients.

One was nearly suffocated by his brother when he was a child.  They were playing with pillows and the brother held one over his face for a little too long.

A few were “tunnel rats” in Viet Nam.  One had been trapped in a fox hole by exploded debris in WWII.

One was buried by sand in a cave-in at dig at work.  He had the quickness of mind to pull his hardhat over his face thus creating a small air pocket which helped to keep him alive until he was dug out from under the ten feet of debris over him.

Most recently I had a gentlemen who was very hesitant to share his story.  With some gentle encouragement, I asked him if he wouldn’t share with me what happened.  He was held prisoner of war for 17 days in a Viet Cong prison camp.  For seven of those days he was sealed in a 50 gallon drum and the drum was beat on from the outside by his captors.  All this had come flooding back to him in a palpable way when he had an MRI done on his neck.  You see, MRI tubes are about the circumference of a 50 gallon drum, and the machine makes banging sounds when scans are being taken.  Despite this, when he found out that the MRI he was going to be having done this time would require him to enter the tube feet first and that his head would be near the opening of the machine, he said “oh, I can do this without any help from medicine”, and he did.  Later his wife told me that although they’d been married shortly after his return from the war, he only recently shared the story of his seven days in the drum.

There is one elderly woman’s story that has stuck with me as well.  She was a Jew who had fled Nazi Germany to England and was buried for many days in the pitch dark under the house in which she was living when it was bombed and collapsed.  She survived but was never again able to be enclosed in a small space of any type. 

Imagine trying to put any of these horrifying things behind you when they spring out at you whenever the walls are too close.

These are stories I will never forget.  And even though I’m not in the ER anymore taking part in life saving activities, these are the patients that bring me satisfaction.

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Dimming the Light In The Red Light District

For years, for as long as I can remember, Amsterdam has been held up as the bastion of freedom…you can buy drugs and sex at stores there like you can buy purses and DVD’s.  And we’ve been told that it’s good.  We’ve been told we should legalize drugs and prostitution here in America, too.  Afterall, it’s not hurting anyone.

Welllllll, they’re shuttin’ down some of those stores in Amsterdam.  Gee, it seems like the city is being overrun by the criminal element.  So they’re shutting businesses down, and dimming the famous the red light.

Amsterdam announced plans this weekend to close brothels, sex shops and pot cafes (marijuana is not legal in the Netherlands, the sale and use of which just ignored) as part of  “a major effort to drive organized crime out of the tourist haven”.  The city is going to focus its efforts on businesses that “generate criminality” which also include gambling parlors, peep shows, and massage parlors.  (Quotes taken from an AP article, link  to full story HERE).

They aren’t going to shut down these industries entirely.  They will be limiting the prostitution to designated areas.  Marijuana cafes will no longer be allowed near schools.

City officials want to bring hotels, restaurants, art galleries and boutiques to the city center and apparently these other “businesses” and the criminality which comes hand in hand with them don’t exactly create the right environment for these enterprises. 

Perhaps we should take a page from the Netherlands playbook and reconsider what sort of things we in America want to embrace with legality and which things might be best left on the law books as illegal.  Why do even more things which will need to be undone when the experiment fails just as it is failing in the freewheeling city of Amsterdam…

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New Gadget – “Unpaid Product Endorsement”

I have loads of negatives and slides that have been lying fallow in boxes.  Many of the prints for the negatives are long gone – given away.  Some are in this or that scrap book.  The prints don’t scan well, at least not with my scanner, which I thought was pretty good, but not so much for photos.  My slides are fewer, but the majority of them are from the summer I spent with Teen Missions in the Philippines.  The summer I met my best friend Connie.  They are pictures and slides that I wish I had access to.  Pictures I’d like to share with family and friends…

And now I can.

Many years ago I looked into buying a system which would transfer these negatives and slides to a digital format.  At the time, the technology was uber expensive and I shelved the idea.  On a plane a few years or so ago in the “Sky Mall” magazine, I saw a device that was much more compact and much less expensive, but still a bit spendy.

On “Cyber Monday” I found a 5 megapixel number for $79 bucks that had excellent reviews and was even smaller than the ones I had looked at before.  I typed, clicked, and bought.  And yesterday, it arrived.  So cool.  Pop the negatives or slides into special trays, run them into the machine, and presto, JPGs!!!!

It’s called the Ion Slides 2 PC.  It’s so easy to use it’s almost a crime.  The quality of the end result isn’t spectacular, but I’m thrilled with it, nonetheless.  My slides are grubby and have particles adhered to them.  I need to look into how to safely clean them.  This is one of the scanned negatives:

This is my nephew, Mitchell, when he was just learning to walk, wearing a pair of Filas I bought for him when he was still a wee baby.  Watching him walking in these (I believe this might be the first time he was in shoes at all) was soooo funny!

And this is one of the scanned slides, complete with specks of dust or whatever:

This one is of Connie.  We were on a bus somewhere in China, and she fell asleep with this panda on her lap.  I love this picture.  I’m excited to have it not in a box somewhere.

Because of the cheap price, ease of use, and pretty darn good JPGs it creates from old negatives and slides, the Ion Slides 2 PC gets “Unpaid Product Endorsement” status.

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Photo Friday – “Winter”

Winter!  My new favorite season since my relocation to Colorado.  Before I decided on Colorado as my new home state, I had visions of the entire state being buried under feet of snow for months on end.  Now, while there is plenty of snow in the mountains, where I live, even though I’m at about 6,000 feet, the snow is only intermittant, and never lasts for more than a few days.  The snow rarely interrupts one’s daily life, though on some days you have to plan ahead and give yourself a little more time to get between points A and B.  And sometimes you need to sweep snow off the car, or shovel a bit of snow in order to get your car out onto the street.  But I will take what I can get, and I love every flake of the stuff.  Winter here is strange.  It was nearly 70 degrees here this past Tuesday.  We had snow two days earlier, and a light snow floated down all day long yesterday!  As I send this to post, it is 11 degrees outside. Who knows what the weekend will bring! 

I posted this picture previously here in another photography meme I did in the past.  It was, and remains, one of my favorite winter pictures that I’ve taken so far.

You can click HERE if you’d like to read the entire original post.

Don’t forget to add your name to Mr. Linky if you’re playing this week.  If you’re not playing, make sure you check out the other players work, drop ‘em a comment, let ‘em know what you think!  

Coming up on Photo Friday (blatantly cut and pasted from “A Curious State of Affairs”):

12th December: Slim’s choice – Christmas Lights

19th December: Author’s choice – The Festive Season

26th December: Photo Friday is taking a break ……. BUT as an option … for those full up with turkey … stuffed to the gills with chocolates … all boozed out … needing a break from the relatives … sick of the festive TV programmes … itching for some “me time” on the computer …. you can post: “funny Christmas photos OR video or of my family” – past and present pictures acceptable! The funnier and more festive the better!

2nd January: New year Video Challenge entitled: New Year Resolutions! (be brave, commit your New Year Resolutions to video so we can all check up on you achieving them as the year progresses!)

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New Format on WordPress

So I logged on to my blog to work on a post that’s been germinating in my brain and I found that my “dashboard” and links all have a new format and presentation. I think I need to take a tour and figure things out. Then I’ll come back and write on what I think about the atheist placard placed in the holiday display area of the Washington State Capitol building.

I can’t see just now how to preview this before posting it, or where I can assign a category to it. Hmmmm…
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New Format on WordPress

So I logged on to my blog to work on a post that’s been germinating in my brain and I found that my “dashboard” and links all have a new format and presentation. I think I need to take a tour and figure things out. Then I’ll come back and write on what I think about the atheist placard placed in the holiday display area of the Washington State Capitol building.

I can’t see just now how to preview this before posting it, or where I can assign a category to it. Hmmmm…

Fortunately my default category of “Whatever” will work just fine for now! 
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Did You Get To See It?

As I drove away from my home on my way to a meeting, I was surprised to see a spectacle in the sky that I had no idea was going to be there…

A crescent moon flanked by a huge and super bright Venus and a smaller and yet still very bright Jupiter suspended over the mountains in a completely clear night sky 

I hear that we won’t see that again until 2050.  Which means I probably won’t live to see it again.  I wish I’d had a telescope.  I also wish I’d had a camera. 

Nonetheless, what a wonderful and gorgeous surprise!

I dragged the people at my meeting out to see it.  Within half an hour the view was obscured by clouds.

Did you get to see it where you are?

I hope so.

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