Who do YOU believe?

Today, when I went upstairs to change for church, I heard a persistent beeping noise. In fact, I heard TWO beeping noises. I went to Tim's room first and found his alarm merrily trying to wake up somebody who wasn't there. It was pretty dark, so I had to turn on his head lamp in order to find the switch to turn his alarm off.

Then I went to our bedroom where our alarm was stubbornly trying to alert somebody (anybody!) that it was time to get up. I use this alarm a lot myself, so even in the dark I know how to turn IT off. I thought I would certainly get a kick out of teasing the 'men' in my life that they don't know enough to turn off the alarm.

Much to my amazement, instead of showing any kind of contrition, they both strenously insisted that they HAD turned their alarms off. Both of them had woken up early (so THEY say), and had virtuously turned off the alarm before they left their respective rooms. From this position they would not budge. They HAD turned off their alarms, and if they really had been on (were they doubting my word?) then somebody must have turned them on again.

As they had watched Ghostbusters together the night before you can imagine what kind of ideas they came up with. They didn't quite have the chutzpah to call me a liar, although they came pretty close.

I have to admit that I had a great deal of sympathy for Joseph Smith. After all, I HAD heard two alarms going off, and I HAD turned them off myself, and no amount of criticism could change that fact. So I ask again - who do YOU believe?

Definitely sick!

Just an add-on. I woke up with such a sore throat this morning (and swollen glands) that I actually went to the doctor and discovered that I have strep throat! They were amazed that I had been fighting it off on my own without antibiotics for so long. I guess all those immuno-enhancing pills that Bill gives me do help. So now I'm on antibiotics, and should be able to go back to work Saturday night.

I should have guessed I was really sick - I haven't had much appetite.

What is sick?

In our house, probably the most dreaded phrase in the English language is "I am sick" closely followed by "I don't feel well". My husband is misophobic, which means he has an abnormal fear of germs. I cannot count the number of nights that I have gone off to work 'not feeling well' and he has been mad at me because he thinks 'I'm sick'.

To my mind, the only times that you are 'sick' enough to stay home from work are 1) You're throwing up 2) You have severe diarrhea and can't stay away from the bathroom for more than 10 minutes 3) You are coughing and sneezing non-stop or 4)You have an extremely high fever.

Last Saturday night I went off to work not feeling very well. Primarily I was very cold and just felt crummy. In fact, I crawled home Sunday morning, fell into bed, and slept for 10 hours. I continued to feel bad and cold for the next couple of days, sleeping fitfully off and on most of the days and nights, but nothing I could put my finger on, so I went off to work Tuesday night as usual. It was a bear of a night because two of our three lab aides weren't there and I worked for over 8 hours before I even got a break. So I came home feeling ultra-crummy.

Wednesday morning my husband got suspicious about my 'feeling cold' and insisted I take my temperature. Horrors - it was 99.8. A sure sign that I was at death's door. He said there was no way I could go to work that night, and I said it depended on my temperature when I got up. I said it would have to be over 100 before I would stay home.

I slept about 9 hours, and when I got up my temperature was exactly 100. A mammoth argument ensued that included me, my husband (Bill), our grandson (Tim) and the boarder (Bob), (whose wife was off to Mutual and he was bored and had wandered upstairs). Both Bill and Tim insisted I had to stay home, I insisted I had to go to work, and Bob (wisely) kept out of it, other than to suggest that we google 'fever' on the Internet and see what the official definiton is.

I retook my temperature about 45 minutes later and it was up to 100.5 and Bill put his foot down and declared I was NOT going to work. I finally gave in. I called work to find out that the two lab aides weren't going to be in AGAIN, so there would only be two of the five workers there. Wow - not a good scenario.

However, I slept another 9 hours last night (drifting in and out of semi-hallucinatory dreams), and this morning my temperature was up to 101.5. I might have to admit that I really am 'sick'. However, I will be taking my temperature again this afternoon to decide if I'm going to work tonight. I'm not throwing up, I don't have diarrhea, I'm not coughing or sneezing - so everything hinges on the fever.

I have a gut feeling that even if my temperature is totally normal this afternoon, Bill (and probably Tim) are going to put a lot of pressure on me to stay home and 'recuperate'. In Bill's mind this means watching movies with him! Anyway, I need to get into the kitchen and do dishes. When I'm sick Bill always tells me that they can wait until I feel better, but by then just looking at them makes me sick all over again!

What's really scary?

Around our house, Halloween is a big holiday. My husband's birthday is the 30th, and when he was growing up, his birthday decorations were always black and orange. Over the years, we have collected an impressive array of 'scary' things, and this year we actually dug a lot of them out and put them up for Halloween.

We went to the local Spirit of Halloween store but were sadly disappointed. Everything was cheap-looking, sleazy, and over-priced. So we didn't buy anything new. In fact, we went to Walmart to get Tim's costume (vampire cape and matching teeth). So here are some pictures of the Halloween decorations we had in our living room. If you look carefully you'll see some of last year's Christmas decorations that never got taken down - including the Christmas tree!

However, I don't think anything we used to decorate the house is quite as scary as my daughter, Miranda, dying her hair blue. I think it looks really, really cool - although I'm not sure I'd have the nerve to do it - even though blue is my favorite color.

I thought about including a picture of our kitchen sink, but I don't think the world is ready for that!

Twilight - the Movie

OK - like a large majority of women in this country, I have read the vampire books about Edward and Bella - relishing every vicarious moment of their romance. In fact, I am now reading them to my husband, who is enjoying them almost as much as I have. I find it hard to believe that he could actually be enjoying them AS much, as Edward is much more captivating than the ever-clumsy and terribly insecure Bella.

So - I am looking forward to the movie that is coming out. At first I was afraid that they would 'telescope' more than one book together, but I read that the author has not yet sold the rights to the other books. This got me to thinking.

Edward and his family are vampires. In fact, Vampires who are several hundred years old (in some cases). But they never age. Edward will perpetually be 17. However, the actor portraying Edward in this film is going to keep getting older (unless he really IS a vampire- which I doubt). So . . . if they don't get cracking on the sequels ASAP, they better have some very, very good make-up artists in the wings to keep everybody looking young. The Harry Potter movies are stretching it a bit, but at least those kids are SUPPOSED to keep getting older.

However, what are movies for but to entertain us and to make us use our imaginations? So, if we can imagine Jabba the Hutt, or a Vulcan and find ourselves believing in them - what's a few years on a vampire? By the way, do they look like the Edward and Bella that you mentally pictured when you read the books?

I LOVE BEING A MOMMY (GRANDMOTHER)

My daughter posted this on her blog for her three children, so I thought I'd do the same. The answers are from (in order) my oldest daughter (32), my younger daughter (29), and my grandson who is also my adopted son (11 - almost 12). It is amazing how close they are on some of the answers!

1. What does mom say to you?
a. I love you
b. I love you
c. Whaaaaaaaat? (in an irritated voice)

2. What makes mom happy?
a. Having the house to herself
b. Having her checkbook balanced and in the positive, and having time to herself
c. When I unload the dishwasher.

3. What makes mom sad?
a. Having to do too many dishes
b. When Dad and Tim fight, or Miranda has problems
c. When Grandpa and me argue, or I misbehave.

4. What does mom do that makes me laugh?
a. She uses funny voices for the different characters when she reads to me
b. She's hilarious all the time
c. She tickles me

5. How old is mom?
a. I have no idea
b. (long pause while calculating) 58
c. 58?

6. How tall is mom?
a. Small like me
b. 5' 1/2" ? 1"?
c. Just as tall as me, about 5 feet tall or less

7. What does mom like to do? (notice that the number of items keeps going down!)
a. Read, cross-stitch, and do puzzles on the computer
b. Read & cross-stitch
c. Cross-stitch

8. What is mom's job? (obviously this isn't a secret)
a. Supervisor in a microbiology laboratory for Quest Diagnostics
b. Microbiologist
c. Microbiologist

9. What is mom's favorite food (they sure nailed this one!)
a. Chocolate?
b. Chocolate?
c. Chocolate!

10. How do you know that mom loves you?
a. She does so much for me - a ton of stuff.
b. She thinks about me a lot
c. She lets me do stuff that Grandpa wouldn't let me do.

This was a very illuminating little exercise - and I would say that all three of my 'kids' know me pretty well.

Mix 'er up

Although plastic mixing bowls are all very well in their place - I happen to like the heavier bowls that are ceramic, glass, Corning Ware, etc. I particularly like that I can bake casseroles in them. However, the drawback is that if they get dropped - they break.

Thanks to the fumbling fingers of my family (how's that for alliteration!), we were getting a bit low on mixing bowls, so I made that a birthday request. My daughter, Maleen, got me an enchanting set of three purple mixing bowls. She said they were pretty pricey, but she wanted to make sure I got the best.

For some reason, my digital camera tends to turn purples into blues, so you'll have to take my word for it that they are actually much more purple than they look in the picture. I use them constantly, although I haven't quite gotten up the nerve to use one of them in the oven yet. It's not that I don't think they could take the heat (ha, ha) - I just don't feel right about it yet. They're still too new.

Much to my surprise, when I went visiting teaching last month, my companion had a late birthday present for me - a set of six ceramic mixing bowls. You would think that would cost a fortune, but not in this case. The are the tiniest, cutest mixing bowls I have ever seen! She said that she couldn't resist getting them for me, and that they are handy when you want to measure out ingredients ahead of time, and then add them one by one. You can see their size compared to the one's that Maleen gave me.

Now the biggest problem I'm going to have is keeping my husband's hands off of them. He is always on the lookout for small little bowls to mix his noxious herbs and supplements in. And just for your information, one of these little bowls is exactly the right size to hold four egg yolks.