All this packing is making me sneeze. LOL Taking a break.
1. Who are your favorite authors? Isaac Asimov, Anne McCaffrey, Mercedes Lackey
2. What are your favorite books? Mists of Avalon, Foundation Series, Dragonriders of Pern Series.
3. What kind of books do you tend to read? Sci-fi, Romance, Mystery...etc...? Yes.
4. Do you prefer to borrow books from the library or buy them? Buy them (when I have the money. LOL)
5. Do you prefer hardcover or paperback? Hardcover, but they're rather expensive. :D
6. What was the last book you read? What are you reading now? Double Dealer, Max Allen Collins. See Left. :D
7. Do you read everyday? Something, not always my books.
8. On average how many books do you read per year? It's gone down quite a bit. 10-20 I'd say.
9. Do you belong to any book clubs? Used to.
10. Recommend a good book. Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Series. First book that actually made me laugh out loud.
Monday is Read Aloud day here in Shine Family Summer School which will start after we get settled into the house. One of the things I thought I might do is find some books on responsibility and character building and have Aidan write reports on them. How a Geek responds to parenting predicaments. LOL
Hmmm...since last we encountered out intrepid heroine...
Meh. Let's see. Ian went to see the autism doc. According to the tests, he has 2 spikes in the borderline area of ADHD, but not enough that she would officially diagnose him with it. Which is fine because I really don't think he has it. He just needs a little help to get engaged in the world around him when it doesn't involve Pokèmon. His teacher was pretty good at that.
We had a bit of drama a few weeks ago. When I got the email from his Special Ed Case Worker saying that he's doing so well he doesn't need the Ed Tech anymore so she doesn't go down there, I was all happy. Then there was an issue they were having, can't remember what it was off the top of my head, but I emailed back and said, Hey, this might be a good way to utilize the Ed Tech time, to support him in this since he doesn't need her for other stuff. Well, that's when I got an email from the teacher saying Boy we'd love to have the Ed Tech back in the classroom, but she stopped coming. So yeah, I panic. I want to know what's going on that I'm getting two different stories from these two people about something as important as Ian's support in the classroom. So I decide I'm going to go down to the school and spend the day, just to see what's going on. I don't tell anyone I'm coming, I just show up. Well, I'm down waiting for the bus to get there when the principal comes out and kicks me out. Says I can't be there without letting them know I'm coming. Well OF COURSE they would say that. How else could they cover up the fact that they're screwing up if they actually let parents see what's going on in the school! I kicked and screamed and wrote the school board and all kinds of stuff, but before I got myself in too deep I heard from someone I work with that the school had just lost a law suit for doing something similar to another family. The fact that they would do it again after a judge telling them it was wrong led me to believe that any further pursuit of the issue on my part would be both painful and fruitless.
So I plunged myself into getting Ian situated at the new school ASAP. I wanted him to be able to go to Step Up day, meet the new teacher, see the classroom and the other kids so he would be prepared for it when school started the next year. The person I talked to at the new school led me to believe this wouldn't be a problem. I should have known better than to believe her after having found out that they had just forgotten to show up at Ian's PET meeting. The girl who took the message of when it would be was horribly embarrassed to realize she had put the sticky on her computer and forgot all about it. As far as I know they didn't go observe him in the classroom or talk to his teacher either. I think they had one conversation with his case worker. So when I called to find out about getting him registered, they tell me I have to have special permission from the superintendent's office to register him without a current address in the city. Well, of course we didn't get the special permission. So we scrambled to find a place to rent in the city, I arranged with out current landlord to move out a month early so we could get things in place in time for Step Up day. I won't go into the gorey details, but it was hideous and stressful.
Got it done, though. We're renting a little bitty house with absolutely no yard pretty close to downtown. John doesn't think it actually qualifies as a city, but I sure do. Anyway. I got both kids registered. They won't be going to the same school anymore. K-3 goes to a school way out in the sticks, right behind the high school. 4-5 go to a school just up the road from us, actually. They won't even ride the same bus, I believe. Aidan didn't get to go to her Step Up day because it was on the same day as their field trip to Ft. Williams and she'd been looking forward to it for a while. She's really going to miss her friends, but luckily at least one of them is moving to Windham as well, so that will be nice. (More about that later.) However, when I found out who her teacher was going to be I emailed him and he told me they were having an Ice Cream Social that night at the school. So we went to that and she had a great time. They have a nice play ground and a big ol hill out back. And her teacher seems very nice. Ian got to go to his Step Up day and it went well. His new case worker, at least I think she's going to be his new case worker, came along to observe, which I really appreciated. It was a bit chaotic as the teacher handed out a paper to fill out while she was going over the summer homework folder, and showing everyone the class pet. You're not going to believe what the class pet is. Wait for it.... a HERMIT CRAB! LOL She asks everyone to guess what's in the tank and our boy was the first one to answer right. She asks all kinds of questions about crabs and he's all over the answers. He tells her about the time he got pinched and she asked what you're supposed to do when that happens. After he answered that one she says "Well, I guess we know who's going to be the first one to take care of the pet!" Heeheehee. My boy. I had to redirect him a couple times to get him to finish the sheet, but as I looked around, I realized that he wasn't the only one not finishing it. That actually made me feel a bit better. The teacher was trying to take pictures of the kids with her digital camera to put with the info sheets, but her camera wasn't working, so I with my "luggage" as John calls it, whip out mine and offer it to her. I tell her I'll put the pics on disc and send them to her. Getting in good with the teacher already, dude. Proactive I am.
For some unknown reason, Ian's teacher gave the kids two research projects at the end of the year. DOH! The first one was a simple biography of someone famous. Ian picked Steve Irwin, which is cool. We do all the research and he types up the paper, makes the poster, then we get a note saying they have to bring "something special" to the presentation to represent their person and dress up like their person. Oh brother! Well, he picks his huge stuffed crocodile as his special thing and since we don't have a lot of khaki hanging around the house we did the best we could with some cargo shorts and an animal TShirt. She had them do a demonstration of their person and Ian actually wrestled this stuffed crocodile in class. She sent home a picture on Tuesday. I'll get it up on MySpace as soon as I can. It's a riot. He got an Exceeds Expectations on that one. The other project was to pick a Maine animal and do a report and poster. This one was more detailed. The research questions were three pages. Now, we helped him a bit more with this one because some of the stuff was just to hard for him to read by himself, but since that's one of his accommodations at school I didn't feel to badly about it. I will cop to typing up the paper, but he actually answered the questions and composed the answers for me to type. He picked lobsters. I don't know what he got on it because she didn't send the grading sheet home, at least that I could find. However, she did give him a big ol rubber lobster toy because he was the only one to pick lobsters and he did his report at home, so I guess that's a good thing.
Overall he did well at school this year. Now I don't know if she was letting him skate on some stuff, but I don't think so. He does seem to know the material pretty well. Some of the stuff he forgets, like government stuff, but heck so do I sometimes. And he got all Exceeds in science. :D My little junior geek.
Aidan is another story all together. She got all 3s in subject matter, which as good as you can get. Well, I think she got one 2, but anyway. The girl is smarter by half than most regardless. However, her behavior went in the tank by the end of the year. UGH! Mostly 1s. ::cry:: Now I think at least some of it had to do with the fact that her teacher was rather lazy. She just kept telling me she thought Aidan had ADHD and never wanted to hear anything about perhaps she needed a different approach in the classroom. I'm hoping this new guy is better. Our PCP took one look at Aidan and said unequivocally that she doesn't have ADHD so we're all going to have to do some work and figure out how to get this girl turned around. I have already given up my dream of her going to Cornell. I refuse to drive around the Old Port at 3 in the morning looking for her when she's 16. If it kills me, she's not going to turn out like me, dangit.
On the last couple days of school, I gave Aidan some "business cards" with our contact info on it to give to her friends so they could stay in touch if they wanted to. Sure enough, yesterday I was sitting at my desk working and I get a call. It's for Aidan. I tell this little girl that Aidan's at daycare, can I take a message. I get her phone number and tell her Aidan will call her later. And on the drive home from daycare yesterday Aidan was chatting away with this kid on the phone. It was hilarious. "I'm going to be in this daycare until such and such, then I start my new daycare on such and such, but I won't be in any daycare on this day and I'd love to have a playdate." I'm still laughing! SHE'S SEVEN! She's seven and she needs an address book and a planner. Cripes.
Anyhoo. We're moving on the 28th. I couldn't get seamless transition with the internet, so I may be unreachable for a couple days there unless you have my phone number. And trust me, that's going to be painful for me. The internet is kind of like my security blanket. Even when I'm not on it, I just like knowing it's there and I can get on it if I want to. LOL It will also mean we won't have cable which will also suck, but I do have a backlog of movies I've been meaning to watch, so I suppose that will be a good excuse. Hee. We're going to be taking over a couple loads of stuff this weekend since we've paid for the last two weeks in June. Much easier in the long run to not have EVERYTHING piled up in that dinky little joint. Wouldn't be able to move. Literally. I mean this place is SMALL. I'm hoping it's only for a year and we can find something larger further out from the city. I'm going to be wicked uncomfortable in this joint. It's right next to an all night gas station and an oil change joint. ::shudder:: The very first investment is going to be blinds for all the windows.
Work is going well. I'm building up my cred as IT guru with the higher ups. I just wish that meant I'd get paid more. Sadly that's not likely to happen any time soon. My boss has been trying to get me a raise forever. It's gotten to the point that she actually suggested that the next time they try to add something to my job description I just say no. How sad is that?
So that's my rant and ramble for today. More later. Peace out.
Saturday was Aidan's 7th birthday. We went to Jokers which is kind of a Chuck E. Cheese type thing. (I, being a dunderhead forgot my camera, but I took some pics at home so fear not. LOL ) This place has a GINORMOUS climbing structure though. I mean this thing is twice the size of the one at Chucky's. So we get there and one of the girls I work with is having an official "invite people and have cake and presents" part there because her daughter's birthday was the next day. They're the same age and I was hoping we would get there quick enough that they could play together, but John got home from work a half hour later than we expected so by the time we got there the kids were already out running around. So we sat and ate our pizza and doled out the tickets and tokens and then let loose the hounds of play.
They spent most of their time in the climbing structure and really, I don't blame em. Did I mention this thing was ginormous? The only one I've see that was bigger was in St. Louis and that one had older kids on staff to go in and find the little ones when they got lost. They did play some games and go on some of the "extra" things like the inflatable slide and moonhouse. Ian really wanted to get tickets so he could get Aidan something for her birthday with them. hee hee Pretty early on Aidan wanted me to go in with her and since I'd seen some other grown-ups in there I figured it would be alright so in I went. Dang it was fun. LOL I was climbin and slidin and all kinds of stuff just following Aidan around. Then I got out for a while so I could go do some stuff wtih Ian. We played and he went on some of the extras, then he wants me to go in the climbing structure with him. Cool! So in I go, but Ian just ain't an intrepid climbing structure explorer. He has his area he likes to stick to so when I suggested going up he wasn't having it. So I went up myself. ::bad mommy!:: I'm climbin and crawling and who should I run into but Aidan! So we head off and as we're passing through this juncture I look up and see a climbing hole in the mesh. I say to my ever adventurous daughter, lets see what's up there! And up we go. This thing went ALL the way to the top so by the time I got up there I was starting to feel a little something in the knees and I was breathin a bit but what should we find when we get up there ::insert heavenly choir here:: the opening to the CORKSCREW SLIDE!!! Oh yeah!!! So down she goes and down I go and of course, we gotta do it again. We're scramblin up there and at the top I'm definitely noticing those things a bit more, but...it's the CORKSCREW SLIDE! But when we got to the bottom and I roll out of that slide I suddenly hear my body screaming at me "YOU'RE 40 YOU IDIOT! STOP IT!" I swear that was the first time I'd actually felt the repercussions of being 40. I still didn't feel 40 though. I was rather offended that my body was being such a killjoy, truth be told. Youth really is wasted on the young. >p So once the tickets were used, tokens spent and stuff gotten at the prize counter we left and headed for home.
We stopped at Wal Mart because Aidan had some money from Great Grandma burning a hole in her pocket so to speak. She picked out a couple Pokèmon (gods they're taking over the whole house!) and we went home. We watched the first Pokèmon movie again (Ian finally got to watch it for the first time the night before and yes, I had to watch it again on Sunday) then we had dinner and cake and ice cream. And presents. Her favorite part. LOL She got some money from Gramma and Grampa and I got her some speakers for her Mix Max.
Daddy got her a little stuffed Turtwig. I never thought I'd ever say this, but I think there is finally a toy that has pulled even with if not taken the place of Blankie. She LOVES this thing! Takes it everywhere makes up whole stories about what it does when she's at school. She leaves it a little (imaginary) cell phone so it can call her if there's an emergency. She leaves him grass sandwiches for lunch and a little TV so he can watch in the afternoon after he trains in the morning. The first thing she did when I stopped to pick them up after school was to call Turtwig and let him know we were on our way home so he wouldn't worry. I'm kind of torn between being amused and being disturbed by the whole thing. LOL Last night when I was tucking her in she was talking to Turtwig and putting his little twig on his head down flat. I asked why and she said it was in case there were any girl Turtwigs around. He wanted to look slick for the ladies. O-o She has another smaller stuffed one that comes in a Pokèball called Pachirisu. That was actually her very first Pokèmon. When we were getting ready for school today she said that Pachirisu slept through training yesterday because he was up all night playing rock, paper, scissors with himself. Tonight she told him he needed to sleep or tomorrow he'd get doomed. Honestly, I have a whole new respect for what goes on in that child's head. She may actually succeed where I have failed as an author someday. Ian and Aidan are both working extra hard this week to behave so they can watch the second Pokèmon movie this weekend. Oh joy. At least after they've watched them a couple times with us so we can make sure they're understanding everything and getting the appropriate message out of them they can watch the silly things on their own. Here's a picture of Aidan and her Turtwig (and Blankie).
I got a VERY good email from Ian's Special Ed Case Worker yesterday. She said that she and his teacher Mrs. E spoke and they've come to the conclusion that Ian is doing very well in class without his Ed Tech so they wondered if it would be alright if she only came to class when Mrs. E though Ian might need her. Geez, I wish Mrs. E could be his teacher forever. I said sure, as long as he is doing well, keeping up and interacting appropriately in class I'm all about him getting used to doing it on his own. I decided that it was time I put that into practice at home as well, so yesterday I told him about the email and said that from now on, he would be doing his homework without me being in the room with him. If he ran into trouble he could ask for help, but he needed to keep himself on task and get everything done on his own. I was a bit nervous, but I'll be buggered if he didn't do great. Of course the first page of homework is always the easiest. It's just sorting spelling words. He flew through that and only flipped a couple of Ss backward. The second page is a bit harder as it has questions he has to read and answer with the appropriate spelling word. When he came and told me he was ready to do his homework today I told him he was on his own again and I could tell HE was a little nervous about it this time. But I told him the same thing, if he got stuck come and get me, but otherwise he was on his own. He got stuck maybe three times on the whole page and only made one error aside from a flipped S. Once again I am confronted with the fact that my child is WAY more capable than I'm giving him credit for. Here I am trying to make sure he's able to advance on par with his peers and it seems I may actually be holding him back. UGH Once I reviewed the page and told him how well he did his face just lit up like a spotlight. I hope he didn't think he couldn't do it because of me. Well, anyway, now we both know he can do it. LOL I really need someone to smack me in the head once in a while and remind me to give the boy more credit.
I'm taking him to the Autism Specialist tomorrow to get him re-evaluated. He hasn't had an evaluation since he was three and since he'll be going into a new school next year I want a current eval to present. They are also going to look and see if he has co-morbid ADHD, which is possible. I'm not ruling it out, because the boy is easily distracted and rather fidgety at times. And since Mrs. E isn't going to be his teacher next year, even though it's a better school district over all, he's not likely to do as well as he is this year, so I want a good, solid IEP in place when we get there. He's really going to miss his Ed Tech, she's been with him since Kindergarten. He already said it's going to be sad knowing he's not going to see her every day this year. I'm a little worried and probably over reacting, but what else is new.
I'll see if I can get some pics up at the MySpace of Aidan on her birthday in the next couple of days. I think that's it for now, though. Lord I can ramble. LOL Peace out.
I'm almost ashamed to say that I have totally immersed myself in the IPod universe. I have 4 of them now. 1 1gig, 1 2gig and 2 8gig video nanos. I've got podcasts on one, audiobooks on one, music on one and TV/Movies on one. It looks like they don't even make the 1gig one anymore. LOL I just love them, they are so cool. I loaded some new old music on one and was listening to it on the drive in this morning. I am somewhat amazed to announce that I still remember all the words to Planet Earth by Duran Duran. HEE HEE I've got everything from Enya to Rammstein to Hank Williams Sr. on this thing and just put it on shuffle and let it go.
Speaking of Duran Duran, I was pondering this morning and no matter how much John mocks me for liking them, I still to this day assert that Simon LeBon was an underrated lyricist. Back in the day I bought a book of their sheet music and spent an afternoon analyzing his lyrics. Made copious notes in the margins. I mean for a kid in his 20s in a serious bubble gum pop industry, there really was some significant stuff in there. SRSLY. Check it out! Almost any song from Rio or Seven and the Ragged Tiger. I'd put some of them up against some of the stuff Evanescence has done. I was listening to Breathe No More last night on the drive home and it gave me goosebumps, but so did a lot of the Duran Duran stuff.
Moving on to one of my favorite entertainment topics, Harry Potter. :D It seems the rumours are true and they are going to split the Deathly Hallows movie into a two parter. There was talk of doing that with Goblet of Fire, but I'm glad they didn't. It really was fine the way it was. I could see an argument for doing it with Order of the Phoenix just because they left out most of the book in making the movie. And I do mean MOST of the book. But then JKR has said that if she could go back and change one thing it would be to make OotP shorter. LOL Now I've read Deathly Hallows twice so far. And both times I bawled like a little baby. Honestly I'm not sure I'm going to make it through Half Blood Prince without being a blubbering ball of goo on the floor. I don't even want to contemplate how I'm going to survive Deathly Hallows let alone having to do it in two sittings. I may die! LOL I do understand, there's just too much in Deathly Hallows that you really can't skip or gloss over and thank the gods the producers understand that. But for us Snape fans it REALLY goes downhill from here.
I was listening to a show on the History Channel International last night (thank the gods for digital cable LOL) called Judas: Traitor or Friend. Normally, I hate to make connections to xtian mythology, but sadly there are still quite a few in modern entertainment, The Matrix being the most prevalent amongst the movies I like. But they had a few scholars on there arguing the point that Judas was acting on Christ's orders to turn him in. That he knew the crucifiction needed to happen to bring about the new kingdom or whatever and that he required this service from one of his most trusted and beloved desciples. This just reminded me so much of Snape and the position he was put in. I wonder if JKR had that in mind...hmmmm. Anyway, throughout the ages the name of Judas has come to be the epitome of traitor and betrayal. And after the end of Half Blood Prince up until the last part of Deathly Hallows the name of Snape became the same in the Wizarding World and for some in the Harry Potter Fandom. Probably most, if the truth were to be told. And I have no idea why I believed that Snape was good that whole time, there were just too many things, small things throughout all the books that pointed to him really being on the side of The Light. Not the least of which being Dumbledore's unwaivering faith and defence of Snape. And his last words on the Astronomy Tower. That, I think, is what really convinced me. A lot of people interpreted that "Please Severus" as a plea for help, and really it was, he was in terrible pain and dying at the time anyway, but mostly it was a plea for Snape to keep his word. He knew it had to happen to save Draco, and because of the Unbreakable Vow Snape himself, and maintain Snape's cover within the ranks of the Death Eaters. It wasn't until the last part of Deathly Hallows that we learn how much that action cost Snape. He suffered greatly for the Order through the years, being asked to put himself in harms way every day of his life when he could have very easily been working at the right hand of Voldemort and living the life of power he dreamed of upon entering his service. I often find myself a bit angry at Dumbledore for this. He took merciless advantage of Snape from the moment Snape came to him for help. But at the same time, I really think Dumbledore came to love Snape in a way, which is why I usually end up forgiving him. LOL He also tried to make Snape's life at Hogwarts as peaceful as possible given the times. He went out of his way to defend Snape to everyone including Moody and Harry. I have to admit, JKR weaves a powerful tale with these books.
I will never again doubt the functionality of igloos. I'm sitting here in the middle of winter in Maine, our house is buried in snow, it's about 30° outside and I'm sweating with the window open. Thermodynamics and insulation being what they are, and all.
Can't sleep. I'm just flat Pokè-d out for the day. Both kids decided they wanted Pokèmon coloring books, so I printed a couple off. Ian had a bit of trouble (which I'll get into in a little bit) but Aidan worked particularly hard to stay out of trouble so she could watch the first Pokèmon movie this weekend. So I watched it with her last night. And this morning. And I'll probably have to watch it again tomorrow. LOL She cried at the same spot I did, when Ash got petrified and Picachu tried to wake him up. At first I thought she was shamming, but sure enough, she was really affected by it. She still thinks it's quite sad, but it didn't bother her as much the second time.
So now, I'm kicking back and watching a wicked old episode of Dr. Who "The Invasion" with Patrick Troughton. A lot of these older ones (Hartnell and Troughton) have been lost and apparently at least the first installment of this one was damaged because the soundtrack was original but the video had been animated. With modern technology from the looks of it. The rest is the original live-action stuff. I owe a great debt of Geekish Gratitude to a dude named Anthony for my growing stock of Dr. Whos. Bless his heart, where ever and whoever he is. LOL
Ok, now to Ian's mess. This past week wasn't a good one for my dear boy. When I stopped to pick the kids up after school on Tuesday I was handed a Bus Slip that Ian had been given. Now I've never liked this bus driver from the time she took over so I was a bit skeptical when I saw it. When I asked Ian what happened he told me that W, the kid he sits next to on the bus and one of his oldest friends got annoyed with him because he was singing a song. He expressed this annoyance by slamming Ian's head into the window a few times and bending up his glasses. Needless to say I was LIVID! I was on the phone to the bus barn before Ian even finished talking. The boss wasn't there but I talked to the driver herself. Turns out that she didn't give him a slip for that incident, but after she moved W, she put a girl, I, next to Ian. Ian has known here for years too, but he was so upset from the attack and he was feeling crowded so he butted his head at I. He didn't actually touch her, but for that he got a bus slip. W didn't get one until I chewed the bus driver out for letting him try and bash Ian's skull in. Then on Thursday, I got an email from Ms. E, his teacher. Seems that Ian's class has been making model mountains in class out of clay and chocolate chips. Sadly, Ian decided to nibble on the mountain range. She emailed me to ask if it would be alright if she let some of the kids tell Ian how they felt about that and whether he should have to give back some of his Ian Dollars that he earns toward the School Store for his work. I said sure to both, but asked if it could be a small group of kids and if one of the teachers could process it with him after to make sure he understood and was ok. Well, when they had their meeting it seems that the kids decided that since they were going to have to throw the models out anyway (the clay was cracking so they'll need to make them again) that Ian's apology was punishment enough, but he had to promise not to touch the new models when they made them unless he was helping to make them. The teacher asked if we though she should take the dollars anyway, but we decided that it would be a good lesson for him to learn about being part of a democratic process. They had their own tribunal and since they were the injured parties, we figured their ruling would stand. However, he didn't get to watch the Pokèmon movie with us. He gets to start over tomorrow and try and earn it for next weekend, though. Here's hoping for a much better week for the poor little guy.
Work was interesting. One of the case managers is leaving and she had an exit interview with the Director of the Company. One of the things the CM brought up was that if we had a Q/A person to do all the case related paperwork (service plans, quarterly reviews and whatnot) the CMs would have more time to actually do work and could carry larger caseloads. Now guess what the first words out of the Director's mouth were. I'll give you three guesses and the first two don't count. Yep "Is that something Kim can do?" I kid you not. My job description is a page and a half long. It has doubled since I started there and aside from cost of living I haven't gotten a raise in all that time. I think they don't keep track of how often they say "Let's just have Kim do it" because if they did they'd KNOW they've pretty close to reached critical mass with my time. GEEZ!
I put in a bid to do a website for a non-profit group for sign language interpreters. Things were going well until someone on the board's rabbi piped up and said he'd do it for free. I give up on ever making money at the web design thing. I've decided it's quite hopeless. Every idiot with a copy of Front Page or Dreamweaver thinks they can make a "professional-looking" web page. Honestly, the things I've seen people come up with just to save money are absolutely atrocious! And, to ad insult to injury, our church, for whom I have been single-handedly doing the website for the past 5+ years has decided they want to pay a UU design company to take it over. I have been fighting for the past 4+ years to redesign the thing and make it functional and interactive. Every year everyone says "That's a GREAT idea!" then nothing happens. Well this year it was happening! I had the new design, I was gathering content, working out functionality people were finally starting to get involved in the process. I had someone who had been wanting to get involved in the website for a couple years finally get on board and she was acting as the coordinator, collecting the information, interfacing with the committees, etc. Well, she got fed up with it after a while. Not that I blame her, it's a frustrating process. But because she got fed up and quit, they apparently assumed that that meant I was fed up and didn't want to do it anymore either. They then tell me that the web page is obviously too much for "volunteers" to do and it's time to bring in professionals. ::ahem:: I'M A PROFESSIONAL!!! PAY ME TO DO IT!!! I was THIS close to something I've been fighting for for so long and not only do they snatch it away from me, but then insult me by PAYING someone else to do what I've been doing for free and was still willing to do for free. I was in the church last Friday dropping off printer cartridges for their recycling program (they use them to help pay the utility bills, I have no idea how it works) and spoke with a couple ladies there. I basically mentioned that I was kind of bummed that I got fired from the website. Well the next day I start getting calls from the minister expressing her concern that I'm feeling badly about the website situation. I haven't answered or returned the messages. I'm not exactly sure what useful thing she could possibly have to say to me. They're not going to give it back to me and I have absolutely no desire to be mollified. Whateva...
Well, I'm starting to wind down. I need to take my meds then I'm going to watch Jamie climb up this elevator shaft in a kilt. Honestly, it's too funny! LOLOL
This is what we see in our front yard EVERY DAY! And every OTHER day we hear we're getting more! Honestly. We've had over 100 inches of snow this year and it's getting quite ridiculous!
Ok, good news: John is permanent in his job now. (can I get an amen from the crowd?) He's still going through the paperwork process, but the corporate office is in North Carolina or something like that so that's no surprise. Not so good news: we've spent all the tax money. The big expense after getting all the debts paid off was having to go out and buy a $750 snowblower. UGH! Not fun. There are a couple more things we need to take care of, but I reckon we'll manage. John's making more money now after all. And the government will be sending the bribe money out around May so that will be nice.
I'm still liking my job overall, but there are a couple of the people who are starting to get on my nerves. One of them isn't that much of a problem cause she's going to be leaving in August, I think. The other one, however, is going to have to get a serious attitude adjustment or I'm gonna have to take her out behind the woodshed. She came into my office yesterday and pretty much informed me that I was a field hand not a house slave and I needed to act accordingly. I think I showed marvelous restraint in not climbing over my desk and knocking her on her a**. She's not a supervisor let alone mine. I talked to my Boss on the phone today since I was home with the kids (snow day) and mentioned the incident. Luckily I had a witness in the room with me at the time. Hopefully she'll at least confirm that it happened. This chick bends over backward to stay out of any kind of office conflict. Ah well. I've been told by several folks that I need to just let it go, and really, I've done everything I can about it. If she just stays out of my face for the remaining time we're working together, I'll be happy.
More less than great news: The Pokèmon Invasion has finally hit the Shine house. Gods help us. I've fought it for years and figured since he'd made it to the age of 9 without ever getting into it I was safe, but no. He read the first Pokèmon book at school and that was all she wrote. And, because Aidan has friends at school who like it, she's getting into it too. ::cry:: If you go over to the MySpace, there's a little movie of them talking about their Pokèmons. Really though, once I'd read the Pokèdex that Ian bought it's not much different than D&D. It's actually much less violent than D&D. We've watched a few of the TV shows and movies and they do have positive themes of sportsmanship, friendship, healthy competition, that kind of thing. I've acquired all but two of the 10 movies and watched the first one so far. I actually enjoyed it, made me cry a bit at the end. They're still a bit too intense for the kids to watch by themselves so we have to watch them together, but that's alright. I think Ian and I are going to have more fun going through the Pokèdex evaluating the individual critters and working on strategies, frankly. He's a Geek after my own heart. LOL
Aidan's birthday is next Saturday and boy is she letting everyone in the house know it. DANG! LOL I think we're going to end up at one of those Chuck E. Cheese type places again this year. I had looked at Build a Bear Workshop, but DANG is that expensive!!! She'll have more fun running around anyways, sitting still isn't her strong suit.
I am looking forward to new TV! I have been reduced to watching Reality TV for something different when I get tired of the DVDs. I've even gotten into Project Runway. ::shudder:: CSI will be coming back soon and I just can't WAIT! And the summer movie scene is shaping up nicely so far. Iron Man is the one I'm going to be making a point of seeing. Robert Downy Jr. can act his a** off when he's sober and the previews look amazing. And surprisingly Hellboy 2 is looking pretty good. I liked the first Hellboy, but I wasn't crazy about it.
Geez, it's been so long since I've blogged that I think there are probably a million other things I've left out, but I'll come back and catch em in a while. I'm in a "feeling a bit better" phase so we'll see.
at 12:52 PM :: ~#~
Daddy got her a little stuffed Turtwig. I never thought I'd ever say this, but I think there is finally a toy that has pulled even with if not taken the place of Blankie. She LOVES this thing! Takes it everywhere makes up whole stories about what it does when she's at school. She leaves it a little (imaginary) cell phone so it can call her if there's an emergency. She leaves him grass sandwiches for lunch and a little TV so he can watch in the afternoon after he trains in the morning. The first thing she did when I stopped to pick them up after school was to call Turtwig and let him know we were on our way home so he wouldn't worry. I'm kind of torn between being amused and being disturbed by the whole thing. LOL Last night when I was tucking her in she was talking to Turtwig and putting his little twig on his head down flat. I asked why and she said it was in case there were any girl Turtwigs around. He wanted to look slick for the ladies. O-o She has another smaller stuffed one that comes in a Pokèball called Pachirisu. 
That was actually her very first Pokèmon. When we were getting ready for school today she said that Pachirisu slept through training yesterday because he was up all night playing rock, paper, scissors with himself. Tonight she told him he needed to sleep or tomorrow he'd get doomed. Honestly, I have a whole new respect for what goes on in that child's head. She may actually succeed where I have failed as an author someday. Ian and Aidan are both working extra hard this week to behave so they can watch the second Pokèmon movie this weekend. Oh joy. At least after they've watched them a couple times with us so we can make sure they're understanding everything and getting the appropriate message out of them they can watch the silly things on their own. Here's a picture of Aidan and her Turtwig (and Blankie). 
