Month: July 2004

  • Picture Time!!!



    I took this pic last night of Corin and Caleb while they were hanging out in my bedroom.  Aren’t they just the cutest!!


    Now tell me something.  Does anyone here see a resemblance between my Corin and this lovely lady?


     


    Uncanny isn’t it??


    I’m spending the weekend with my girls…going back (hopefully) to the RenFest tomorrow and just hangin’ out!!


    Have a great weekend!!!


     

  • What are you lookin’ at?


    The Richardson ground squirrel uses ultrasonic frequencies to provide a warning to fellow members of its group, the first time an animal has been found to use high-frequency sound this way.(AFP/File/Paul Richards)

  • Just Hangin’ Out…


    A giant panda cub rests at a panda park in the outskirt of Chengdu, capital of China's southwestern Sichuan province, July 27, 2004. China's giant pandas are rebounding from the brink of extinction, thanks to an improved and expanded habitat, but they are not out of the woods yet, forestry officials said in June. The first comprehensive Chinese study of the mammal since 1988 showed that more than 1,590 giant pandas now roam China's forests, and another 161 pandas have been raised in captivity. REUTERS/Bobby Yip


    I don’t have a lot of time today…so I’ll leave you with this!  Happy Hump Day!


    You entered: 7/2/1975


    You were born on a Wednesday
    under the astrological sign Cancer.
    Your Life path number is     4.



    4
    The Life Path 4 produces the most trustworthy, practical, and down-to-earth of individuals; the cornerstone members of society. The goal of this life path is learning to take orders and to carry them out with dedication and perseverance. You always demand as much from yourself as you do from others, and sometimes a lot more. You have the kind of will power that is often mistaken for sheer stubbornness. Once a decision is made, it will be followed through to the conclusion, right, wrong, or indifferent; you are very set in your ways and determined to handle things the way you are so certain that they should be handled. Your tenacity of purpose and ability to get the job done borders on obsession.

    You are an excellent organizer and planner because of your innate ability to view things in a very common sense and practical way. You are a wonderful manager with a great sense of how to get the job done.


    Loyal and devoted, you make the best of your marriage, and you are a dependable business partner. Friends may be few in number, but you are very close to them and once friendships are made, they often last a lifetime. The number 4 is solidly associated with the element of earth from which it gains it strength and utter sense of reality. You are one of the most dependable people you know. If patience and determination can ever win, you are sure to achieve great success in life.


    The negative side of the 4 can prove dogmatic to an excess, narrow-minded, and repressive. A lot of skin-deep people turn you off, and you lack the tact to keep your feelings from being totally clear to all around. Additionally, the negative 4 has a bad tendency to get too caught up in the daily routine of affairs and often misses the big picture and major opportunities that come along once in a while.

    The Julian calendar date of your birth is 2442595.5.
    The     golden number for 1975 is 19.
    The     epact number for 1975 is 17.
    The year 1975 was not a leap year.

    As of 7/27/2004 3:42:49 PM CDT
    You are 29 years old.
    You are 348 months old.
    You are 1,517 weeks old.
    You are 10,618 days old.
    You are 254,847 hours old.
    You are 15,290,862 minutes old.
    You are 917,451,769 seconds old.

    There are 340 days till your next birthday
    on which your cake will have 30 candles on it.

    Those 30 candles produce 30 BTU’s,
    or 7,560 calories of heat (that’s only 7.5600 food calories!) .
    You can boil 3.43 US ounces of water with that many candles.  

    There are 151 days till Christmas 2004!

    The moon’s phase on the day you were
    born was waning crescent.


    http://www.paulsadowski.com/birthday.asp


     


    Ya know…this describes me pretty well…


    BTW…yes, I totally swiped this from another Xangan…so yeah, there I admit it!

  • Semi Accident in the Keys


    A separated trailer, from a tractor-trailer truck, dangles off the Channel 2 bridge on the Florida Keys' Overseas Highway near Islamorada, Fla., Monday, July 26, 2004, following an accident with a disabled vehicle. The tractor portion of the rig remained on the bridge. One person was taken to a local hospital with unspecified injuries. (AP Photo/Monroe County Sherifff's Office, Aviation Unit)A separated trailer, from a tractor-trailer truck, dangles off the Channel 2 bridge on the Florida Keys’ Overseas Highway near Islamorada, Fla., Monday, July 26, 2004, following an accident with a disabled vehicle. The tractor portion of the rig remained on the bridge. One person was taken to a local hospital with unspecified injuries. (AP Photo/Monroe County Sheriff’s Office, Aviation Unit)
    Mon Jul 26,11:01 AM ET  


    Okay…here’s a good question for ya.  First off, when you’re on a highway out in the middle of the ocean, how do you not notice a disabled vehicle?  I mean, it’s not like there’s a TON of traffic out there right?


     


     


     


    a portion of a tractor-trailer truck, dangles off the Channel 2 bridge on the Florida Keys' Overseas Highway, near Islamorada, Fla., Monday, July 26, 2004, following an accident with disabled vehicle. The tractor portion of the rig remained on the bridge. One person was taken to a local hospital with unspecified injuries. (AP Photo/Dan Baker)


    Second, it says that they took one person to a “local hospital” right? So, exactly how far away would that be from the middle of the ocean to be considered local?


    I’m not trying to be smartass or anything..but I mean, this stretch of the highway is in the Florida Keys…it is out in the middle of ocean right?  Well…I suppose it’s not exactly in the “middle” of the ocean…but you are surrounded by water out there.


    I’d hate to be the one who had to rally up equipment to get that trailer back onto the highway.


    Now you all know how much I love the water…but umm…nope…forget it!

  • Hello…my name is Dory…. 


    Oh wait…that’s not my name.  Hmm…I really need to stop watching Finding Nemo so much eh?  Yeah right…tell that to Caleb!!!


    So I sat on my butt most of this past weekend…aside from doing a few loads of laundry….like 12 or so.  Oh yeah…and taking Jason out to dinner on Friday!!  Dinner was YUMMY!! We went to Black Angus and had steak…mmmmm.   Then we came home and !!


    But he did get some of his school work done…honestly he did.



    So the auto glass guy just left…and I am now the proud owner of a brand spanking new windshield!!!   Now I need to get new wiper blades because my old ones are torn up due to the pits that were in my windshield and the crack…hmm.


    Well…I know I’m not discussing much today…but I’ve got a LOT to do at work.  Ya know…I just hate it when my work interferes with my play time on Xanga.

  • Surprises…


    Yesterday I got my second “installment” check for my yearly bonus at work.  Not tons of money, but definitely enough to replace my windshield and take care of few things.   So I should have a new windshield on monday!! YAY!


    Since Jason and I went to the RenFest, I’ve been wanting to get some renaissance clothes for us.  I thought that we could wear it for Halloween and for RenFest in the years to come.  I love the style of that era, particularly the Italian Renaissance clothing circa 1470 to 1505!


    I found the gown that I want on ebay and it will be custom made for me. Very nice!!  The only difference is that mine will be a cream color for the chemise with a wine colored overdress.  The best part is that this is going to cost under $100 to have done and shipped to me!!


    Now, I haven’t purchased this yet due to a little issue that I’m currently having with PayPal.  I’ve had an account with them for a few years now and recently changed my name to my married name.  However, now they want to re-verify all of my accounts!!!  This includes my visa that I want to use.  Now, I put in another card  thinking that they would lift that stupid spending limit, but if I try to purchase anything using their service, it automatically defaults to the second credit card and not the primary card that I want to use!!!


    So, I’m a bit perturbed with them right now…if you haven’t already guessed.  The good thing is that the seller’s of the items that I’d like, will except money orders and some even take personal checks.  So I have a way around it…but I liked the quickness of using PayPal for purchasing…oh well.  I’ll just do it the old fashioned way I suppose.


    Meanwhile, I’m still looking for an outfit for Jason.  He wants one similar to the one he had as a Halloween costume a few years ago, but I just don’t see that happening.  First of all, it was not in the same time period as the ones I’m finding and second of all…it was quite elaborant and those are very costly.  I’m trying to get these without breaking myself in the process.  His is much more difficult to find than mine.


    I think that my best bet is to buy his as seperate pieces and then put an ensamble together myself.  I’m very picky…but so is he and I think that our tastes may conflict a bit…but I’m going to do my best! I’ll let ya know how that turns out.



    Plans for this weekend? Well…I’m taking my hubby to dinner tonight.  Then, I’m going to sit on  and watch movies and do a whole lot of nothing!!  Yup…I said nothing.  The reason for this…I pulled my muscle in my abdomen again.   Caleb was on the top of the stairs and jumped at me…so I had no choice but to catch him…and when I did, my muscle popped.  So, I’m going to put some ice on it and take it easy this weekend.  Hopefully I’ll be better by Monday!


    Jason has school work to do this weekend…so I’ll just be entertaining myself.  Of course I’m sure I’ll have to do the occassional “Jason go do your homework” thing.

  • Peter Bergen


    July 21, 1981 – November 25, 2001


    Peter would’ve been 23 today had he not died in November of 2001.  His death was one of the most devasting things to ever happen to me.  It was but a week after he died that Caleb was diagnosed with Autism.  I think the combination of those events is what sent me into a deep depression that took over my life for several months. 


    I still think of Peter every day and I still cry from time to time.  Peter was too young to die…but way to good to be here.


    Time heals all wounds it’s said, but time hasn’t healed my heart when it comes to Peter.  He was my best friend and in so many ways he was my twin.  His death still hurts me today just as much as it did on that Sunday when he died.


    Happy Birthday sweetie…I miss you so much.

  • A thank you & a drenched wench?!


    Before I get started on my weekend recap, I’d like to thank you all for your supporting comments regarding the new budget for Autism research.  It does my heart good to know that so many people are recognizing that Autism is something that is important and is a real threat to our children.


    I read one of my fellow xangan’s sites yesterday and her son has Autism as well.  She was talking about the emotional roller coaster that Autism puts a parent through.  It was difficult for me to read only because I know those emotions all too well, but I was glad to see that she was sharing that with her readers.  People need to understand how life shattering it is to have your child live life with this horrible disorder and how it affects everyone around you…not just your immediate family, but friends and other relatives as well.  It is truly devastating.


    I’m blessed to have such a wonderful, affectionate, loving son.  However, when he slips into the darkness of Autism, it’s the saddest thing in the world because that child that is normally so affectionate turns somewhat violent and cold.  It’s beyond heartbreaking.  If I could trade places with him I would in a heartbeat, but I can’t and I know that I can’t…which makes it even that much more difficult to watch.  He is my baby and I love him more than life itself, but even I can’t save him from the darkness of Autism…but I can and do help him fight it every single day and I will continue to do so for the rest of my life…that I can promise.  



    Okay…moving on…


    Jason and I took our oldest daughter, Dora to the Renaissance Festival on Saturday.  We didn’t arrive until around 1pm…they open at 10am…so we had to park in the outer-perimeter parking area.  In other words, we had to hike to the entrance!!


    It was a bit muggy outside, strange for Colorado, but the humidity was high due to a storm that had just passed the night prior and a storm front that was moving across the area.  Now the forecast called for partly cloudy skies and a high of 85° …not bad eh?  Yeah…that’s what we thought as well.  So we dressed in shorts and light clothing and comfortable shoes.


    After hiking our way to the entrance, and having to stop for me to catch my breathe after the big hill, we entered into the festival grounds.  The grounds are in an evergreen forest in the foothills.  The scenery is very pleasing and it does take you back a bit once you hear the festive music and see the cast of characters dressed in the renaissance fashion.  In other words, I was totally in my element there.  I love that style of clothes and have always been intrigued by that time period.  So this was right up my alley!


    We walked around looking at various shops filled with clothing and artifacts.  We took in a few stage acts and then it began to thunder and lightning.  The clouds had rolled in and the sky was becoming dark…partly cloudy my ass!  We decided to head back to a shop that Dora had wanted to purchase a necklace from and just as we walked around the bend we heard this huge boom and lightning flashed so bright that it lit up the entire sky! It sounded like a bomb had gone off!!  Everyone immediately ducked and ran into the nearest shop to take shelter.  Then it was as if the sky was unzipped and the water was released…it was pouring!! 


    It continued to rain steadily (a good soaking) for next hour or so…and had no signs of letting up. Yup…we were in the middle of an evergreen forest, surrounded by large trees, in the middle of a lightning storm…good place to be eh?   When it finally let up a little bit, we started to make our way towards the exit, but it started back up again so we stood in yet another shop to see it would pass.  It didn’t.


    Finally, Jason convinced me to just hike it back down to the car so we could go home considering it didn’t seem as if we’d be doing much more there.  So we did just that and were quite drenched by the time we got to the car.


    We got home…and it was a bit colder outside then it was when we’d left that morning,  not to mention we were still wet from walking in the rain, so we went in the house, changed into some dry warm clothes…packed up the boys and headed over to the buffet for dinner!  Hey…all you can eat BBQ…who wouldn’t want to go right?


    So that was it…our renaissance adventure!  Hopefully we’ll be able to go back again when it’s a bit dryer outside and see the rest of it, considering we only go to see about a third of the grounds.


    I hope your weekend was dryer than mine!!

  • Some good news…


    The following is an update that I received by email this morning from ASA (Austism Society of America).









    House Funding Panel Increases Spending on Federal Autism Programs


    Yesterday, the House Appropriations Committee approved increased funding for autism-related research and surveillance

    programs at the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and directed the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to

    devote sufficient resources to the autism research agenda for fiscal year 2005. 

    The Committee provided over $2 million in increased funding for CDC’s surveillance initiative, the ADDM (Autism and

    Developmental Disabilities Monitoring Network) and CADDRE (Centers for Excellence for Autism and Developmental Disabilities

    Research and Epidemiology) centers, and the Autism Awareness and Education Campaign.  This brings the total funding for

    autism activities at the CDC to $18 million.  ASA’s advocacy efforts played an integral role in securing an increased federal

    commitment to autism research, surveillance, and education.


    Good news eh?!


    That was a good way to end the week for me.


    Have a wonderful weeekend!!