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Statistics |
| Unique Visitors: 0 |
| Total Unique Visitors: 39 |
| Visitors Out: 1283 |
| Total Visitors Out: 2127 |
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| Butterflies, Of Course! |
| 2007-08-16 17:17:03 |
The Boy has always been very good about going to bed at night. He hardly ever complains when we tell him it’s time–he knows the routine, hits the bathroom, puts his jammies on, picks out his books and his stuffed animal for the evening, and climbs right on into bed. After we’ve read to him [...]...
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| The Big Apple |
| 2007-08-13 16:32:06 |
You can’t come all the way to Connecticut from the UK without spending at least one day in NYC, so this weekend Meg and her friend and I took cousin Jack to the Big Apple. We did a whirlwind tour that included Grand Central, Times Square, Toys R Us, Jekyll & Hyde’s, the [...]...
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| Yard Work |
| 2007-08-11 16:04:26 |
Adventures in tree trimming continued this weekend. Uncle Martin very generously rented us a wood chipper, and then after helping Cliff take down another tree, he taught everyone how to use it. Sadly, Martin had to head home Saturday afternoon, but we thoroughly enjoyed his visit, and not just because he reorganized our [...]...
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| How Many Men? |
| 2007-08-08 03:24:37 |
We’ve got a bit of a full house at the moment. Cliff’s nephew from the UK is here visiting for a couple of weeks, and Cliff’s brother from Florida is here for a few days as well. We’ve crammed the two of them into our basement in lieu of actual guest bedrooms (sorry, [...]...
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| Watermelon Babies |
| 2007-08-05 14:16:30 |
Okay, they’re Shana and Mark’s babies, and really, I should let her post this picture… but I can’t help it! They’re so dang cute! These are my twin nephews enjoying a bit (a BIG bit) of watermelon on my back lawn. Aw!...
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| Whistling Fool |
| 2007-08-02 14:39:33 |
The Boy has been working on his whistle for months now. Every so often we’ll catch him sitting somewhere, all puckered up and trying so hard to produce that coveted sound. It has been a source of great frustration to him, but we’ve all encouraged him to keep practicing.
And then, low and behold, the other [...]...
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| Simple Pleasures |
| 2007-07-26 02:10:13 |
The Boy has a lot of toys. He has bins full of dinosaurs and pirates and cars and Legos and animals and robots. He has a train set and a tool kit and a bag full of treasure and a variety of balls in a variety of sizes. He has buckets and [...]...
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| Home and Gone Again |
| 2007-07-22 17:15:14 |
So the Girl has been home and is gone again after her week in Utah with relatives. Getting her back presented more than a few challenges.
Seems that the lines at the airport in Utah were monumentally huge. By the time the Girl and her aunt made it up to the check-in counter and got [...]...
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| At Least We’ll Have Pumpkins |
| 2007-07-20 20:19:02 |
Our garden has not been a great success so far this year. We planted a variety of veggies, but between the deer and the bugs and the overly shady shade trees, only a few have really thrived.
We had peas that were looking pretty hardy, but some nasty little beetles did a number on them… [...]...
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| Speaking His Mind |
| 2007-07-17 19:01:26 |
The Boy has a lot to say these days. Most of what he says falls into two categories–questions and complaints.
The Boy’s questions are not your typical four year-old’s I’m-asking-for-the-sake-of-asking questions. No, this kid really wants to know! And he does not tolerate half-assed answers. For example, here are the questions he asked me on the way to daycare this morning:
How do rocks grow?
Are rocks alive?
Are weeds alive?
When weeds are brown, are they dead?
Can brown weeds be alive again?
How do cars go fast?
What is gas?
How do you make gas?
Where do you get gas?
How does gas make a car go?
Does water break rocks?
Why does water break rocks?
How long does it take for water to make sand?
Now… I don’t know about you, but I only knew how to answer, oh, maybe a third of those questions with any kind of authority. When I hedged and told the Boy he would have to ask his dad later, he got very angry and told me, “You know these thing...
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| The Road |
| 2007-07-15 21:13:09 |
I recently finished one of the best books I’ve read in years. From the very first sentence, I was completely engrossed in The Road by Cormac McCarthy.
It is not an easy read–while the plot is fast-paced and the language clear and succinct, this story is bleak and emotionally exhausting. That given, you won’t be able to put it down.
You may be surprised to hear that this post-apocalyptic nightmare is actually a story of hope. It will be worth your while to make it to the end of The Road.
And when you do, give me a call so we can talk about it!...
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| Pig Maintenance |
| 2007-07-12 17:25:35 |
Since the Girl has been gone, enjoying the great outdoors, socializing, and developing her leadership skills at camp, the care and maintenance of her guinea pigs has fallen to me. At first I was kind of excited to be caring for Brownie and Blondie–I’ve always loved guinea pigs, and I figured this was my chance to bond with the furry things.
The little piggies greet me each morning with a chorus of wheeks… not so much because they missed me terribly… it’s more of a where-the-heck-have-you-been kind of tone. Where’s the fresh fruit! More veggies! More hay! They climb up onto their feeding tray and wait, tapping their feet impatiently, looking from me to their empty bowls, or else they stand on their hind legs, looking out of their cage at me with an expression on their piggie faces like: Dude! Big food bringer-type thing! What’s taking so long?!
Beyond the daily feeding and watering, the Girl’s pigs require regular cage cleaning. TH...
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| Running Hot or Cold |
| 2007-07-08 14:38:38 |
Cliff and I have this standing disagreement about the best way to cool off in warm weather. Cliff firmly believes in the cold shower school of thought. I’m a believer in hot showers.
The cold shower theory seems practical–if you’re hot, a dowsing in cold water is definitely going to cool you off.
The thinking behind hot showers is the hot water will open up your pores helping your body to cool off–plus the air will feel cooler when you step out.
I love hot showers–LOVE them! The hotter the better. And until recently you’d never find me in a cold shower except under dire circumstances… and indeed, it was dire circumstances a couple of weeks ago that prompted me to lower the water temperature for my daily cleansing one evening.
I got sunburned.
Not a blistery, instant skin-cancer burn, but one that was red and raw enough that even the thought of allowing anything warmer than an ice cube to touch my body made me shutter. I considered the pos...
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| Teen Leader |
| 2007-07-07 23:18:18 |
Our Girl survived her first week away at camp. This is her first year as a TL–a teen leader. Her job is to be:
Alive!
Alert!
Awake!
Enthusiastic!
…for all the younger campers… and to do whatever the councilors tell her to do which includes, but is not limited to, errand running, bathroom duty, water fetching, boo-boo triage, and snack distribution. In a word (hers, not mine): slavery.
The good news is, she actually enjoyed it. If I or any of her aunts had asked her to do the same sort of drudgery for her sibling/cousins, the attitude would have been much different. But throw in some other girls her own age, some teenage boys, a few hunky guy councilors and hip girl councilors, and suddenly the heat and the chore lists aren’t nearly so horrible.
She’s actually asked for an extra week of camp this summer… and we’re gonna give it to her....
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| Wabbit Hunting |
| 2007-07-05 22:27:51 |
The Boy and I were playing in the backyard the other evening when we spotted a couple of brown bunnies nibbling at our neighbor’s brand new grass. The boy, great white hunter that he is, immediately headed off to catch them. I followed him about halfway across the lawn before he turned to me, mimed for me to stop, then began creeping, soooo slowly, sooo carefully towards them wascally wabbits.
About five minutes into his hunt, I noticed that our neighbor had come out to water her lawn. She had stopped mid-yard, like me, and was watching the boy’s progress. I waved to her and she smiled at me, and then we turned our attention back to the wabbit hunting.
He was trying so hard! It really was a sweet sight.
Well, he made it all the way down the yard (it took him a good ten minutes) and was just on the other side of the big bush the bunnies were sheltering under, when one of them spied him, and hopped off into the woods. The other bunny followed suite, at which point the b...
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| How I Spent My Summer Vacation |
| 2007-07-02 03:55:47 |
We started out the week easy–a dip in the pool at the YMCA, lunch with the cousins, and a lazy afternoon around the house. The next day we wandered a bit further from home and went strawberry picking at Jone’s Farm. Wednesday, feeling ambitious, we went to the lake with the cousins and played in the mucky water and chased babies before crashing at Shana’s place for lunch.
Thursday we decided to stay home, but filled the wading pool and played with some different cousins for awhile in the backyard before it got too hot to move. Friday we swam again at the Y, then went to see Ratatouille–which got Meg itching to do a bit of gormet cooking. I had the most delicious avacado-swiss burger for lunch!
Saturday we went to Quassy for Sikorsky’s family day and rode the rides and watched the kids swim and ate fried food and got sunburned and celebrated my birthday. Today we took Meg to camp where she’s going to do a two-week stint as a Teen Leader before fl...
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| Graduation |
| 2007-06-21 15:56:49 |
They marched in to Pomp and Circumstance, and took their places on the stage. We said the Pledge and the band played the Star-Spangled Banner before the ceremony began. One of their classmates spoke followed by the school principal, and the vice principal. Then the 8th grade choir sang “I Hope You Dance” before a few special awards were given out. Our girl got the Creative Writing award.
Certificates were handed out one by one, and then the whole class exited to Pomp and Circumstance again. And that’s it. Eight grade is over–she’s officially a high school Freshman!
And get this–she’s starting high school with two advanced classes–Spanish 2 and Algebra 2. She’s going to have her hands full but we know she’ll excel.
Congratulations, Meggie! We’re so proud of you!...
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| Internet Addtiction |
| 2007-06-20 14:47:15 |
I came across this WiReD article today about a few of the wide-ranging disorders those of us who are addicted to the internet are prone to. You know, things like Narcissitic Blog Disorder and E-mail Gullibility Syndrome.
I think I have a slight case of them all…...
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| Fish Park |
| 2007-06-17 16:15:00 |
View Photo Slideshow
Shana and Mark introduced us to a great park out in their neck of the woods. It’s the Own Fish Memorial Park, or Fish Park for short. It has great play equipment, big picnic tables, lots of shade, and a creek for the kids to get muddy in. We ate an early dinner there and let the boys play....
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| New Hardware |
| 2007-06-16 16:22:33 |
This is Meg’s newest piercing.
… Not the little spiral-ly thing.
… Not the little pink ball.
See that bar going through her cartilage in two places? Yeah. That.
The guy that did the piercing seemed to take great pleasure in teasing the Girl about gushing blood and oozing infections and kids passing out whenever he made these kinds of holes in folks’ ears. I enjoyed listening to him take pleasure in teasing the Girl.
Still, she soldiered on and got that lovely bit of 14-gauge steel pushed through the shell of her ear.
And, really–admit it–it does look kind of cool.
Before y’all freak out (Mom and Kathy… Mom, you do still read this blog, don’t you?), understand that this is really only half again as thick as a normal earring, so if she ever wants to take it out, she can–the holes won’t be that noticable. And she can always switch the bar to a couple of hoops or studs later on. And in terms of things she could...
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| Squirrel Obstacle Courses |
| 2007-06-15 18:58:25 |
Anybody up for a squirrel obstacle course competition?
Bet our squirrels are smarter than your squirrels!!
Check out these videos for some inspiration…
our YouTube Picks of the Week...
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| Dinner Dance Diva |
| 2007-06-15 16:03:24 |
My Girl attended her first semi-formal dinner dance last night. Doesn’t she look gorgeous?! Scary, huh!
The graduating class of her middle school enjoyed a ziti dinner at the local golf course club house and then jammed to a live band for the rest of the evening. The school (so sensibly!) had a “no touching” rule, so no slow dances or partnering off. Instead–one big group groove!
The Girl and her posse made sure to recruit what she refers to as “the geeky guys” and included them in their circle–good girl! Seems all my “ugly duckling” lectures and “Bill Gates was a nerd too, you know” talks have finally sunk in.
Anyway, all reports point to a goodly-sized group of teens having had a really good time last night, and not a drama or a trauma to be found....
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| Hulk Jr. |
| 2007-06-14 15:41:56 |
In general, the Boy is a mild child. He likes gathering bouquets of flowers and nature walks and bird-spotting. He’ll play for ages in the garden with nothing but a bit of water and a few newspaper boats, or a bottle of bubbles, or a discarded stick. He’s affectionate and helpful and usually cheerful…
Until someone gets him mad.
Much like Bruce Banner, when provoked sufficiently (or when watching Power Rangers, Pokemon, or any superhero series on TV), my Boy becomes a raging beast. A Hulk Jr., if you will. He packs a pretty powerful punch, as his dad can attest to–he got knocked on the nose just the other day by a peeved little person.
I’d say it’s a boy thing–testosterone getting the better of his gentle nature–except that I can remember similar outbursts from my girlie Girl. By the time she was seven or eight, she was already gaining on me heighth-wise, and was strong enough to bowl me over and keep me down pretty much as long...
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| Garden Update (a.k.a. Damn Critters!) |
| 2007-06-10 20:44:55 |
After a deer wiped out my sunflowers and corn–why they munched just those two plants I’ll never know–Cliff finished putting up the fence around our little garden plot, and created a sturdy gate. Very good, I thought. The rest of the veggies are safe now, at least from critter attacks.
Wrong!
Some dumb bird ate my watermelon plants! Okay, not all the watermelon plants, but a whole row of them anyway.
And little gray beetles are attacking my peas!
And a really annoying squirrel keeps digging at my potted tomatoes!
It’s my first year gardening and really, I could use a few successes to bolster my confidence. Just a few red, ripe tomatoes, a fistful of finger-long carrots, and maybe a cucumber or two would truly make me smile. Honest. That’s all I want.
The one crop I’m pretty sure I’m going to have plenty of is pumpkins. Yup, the pumpkin plants look plenty healthy and nothing seems to be bothering them.
Sigh.
At least this year we won’...
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| What IS This, Anyway? |
| 2007-06-09 14:22:53 |
When I initially started blogging years ago, I did it as a move from paper journal to digital diary. I was doing what I’d always done–writing down my thoughts and feelings and observations as a service to myself, just in a new medium.
It wasn’t long, however, before I discovered the joys of reading other people’s blogs. I loved this form of literary voyeurism. I thoroughly enjoyed glimpsing the lives of others, some of whom were just like me and some with which I could barely identify. All of whom were fascinating!
I shifted my audience from ’self’ to anonymous ‘others’.
Over time, I became more blog-savvy. I discovered Blogger and MovableType and Wordpress. I found out about comments. Oh, comments! The bliss of writing something, anything, worthy of a comment (even if it is just you, Mom) became so addicting!
Eventually my blog evolved into a way to stay in touch. It was my main method of keeping parents and grandparents abrea...
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| How? |
| 2007-06-07 22:35:27 |
How did a child of mine get herself into Spanish 2 her freshmen year of high school, and honors Algebra?
I failed French twice and barely pulled through Latin in high school. I also failed just about every math class I took with the exception of a year of Geometry and Business Math.
It’s a good thing Cliff is comfortable with numbers. When he and Meg start talking about factoring trinomials and rational expressions, I climb under the table and start playing “rocket ship to the moon” with Ben cuz just listening to them gives me a headache!
It’s finals week for our intrepid 8th grader. She’s already survived the Spanish, Reading, and Writing tests, and today it’s Social Studies. How much do you know about the Industrial Revolution, and how many Constitutional amendments can you name? I can tell you, I know a lot more now than I did before Meg started studying for this final.
I am skeptical of the education system in this country sometimes, an...
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| When Outside Comes In |
| 2007-06-06 20:32:42 |
It’s that time of the year when all the creepy critters are out and about and sometimes… they come in. We’ve had ants, beetles, catapillars, wasps, flies, mosquitos, and more spiders than I care to encounter walking around the place like they own it.
Last night, we added a new bug to our list of uninvited house guests.
The kids were in bed, the lights were out, and Cliff and I were just drifting off to sleep when I noticed weird lights beyond the window shade.
“What’s that light,” I asked my sleepy husband.
“Lightning,” he said.
“Really?”
“Someone with a flashlight?”
“Maybe… I don’t think that’s lightening.”
We climbed out of bed and headed to the window to check it out. The lights were bright, random, and… moving? We raised the shade, and looked out on the dark yard. The sky was overcast, but it definitely wasn’t storming. There were lights on next door, but nobody...
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| Touch-A-Truck |
| 2007-06-03 17:51:34 |
The Milford Junior Women’s League hosts this great event every year called Touch-A-Truck. This is the first year that we’ve attended, and it really was pretty cool. They had vintage fire engines, big ole’ semi cabs, backhoes, dump trucks, an ambulance, and a patrol car parked all over the field at Eisenhower Park. The kids got to climb all over these trucks, honk the horns, set off the sirens, and make announcements over the loudspeakers. The Boy loved it!
The also gave away free bike helmets to the first 250 kids who showed up, had a rock-climbing wall, and a bouncy castle for the kids to play in. The boy gave the rock-wall a try, and was all smiles as he climbed above his dad’s head, and then let go and hung in the air as he slowly descended.
Meg was a bit bored–I guess trucks don’t inspire a lot of interest in teenage girls, but she was a good sport, helping her brother in and out of the cabs and following him around from activity to activi...
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| Habitat for Humanity |
| 2007-06-02 16:44:19 |
Cliff spent his Saturday morning renovating a house with some of his work colleagues through Habitat for Humanity. Nice view, eh! He enjoyed it so much that he’s hoping to become a regular volunteer. Care to join him? Click here for info....
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| Stinky Stunk |
| 2007-05-30 16:17:16 |
While driving home…
Me: Phew!
The Boy: Was that a stunk?
Me: You mean a ’skunk’?
The Boy: Yeah.
Me: Yup.
The Boy: Was it a dead stunk?
Me: Yes, it was a dead ’skunk’.
The Boy: Why?
Cliff: It got run over.
The Boy: Did we run over it?!
Cliff: No, someone else did.
The Boy: It was a stinky stunk....
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| How Does Your Garden Grow? |
| 2007-05-29 16:02:40 |
Things are actually growing in my little garden!
For awhile there I wasn’t sure much of anything was going to sprout, but the peas are going great guns over in the corner. I’ve got three little tomato plants that are still hanging in there, and a few new ones starting to come in. The carrots have decided to poke their leafy greens above ground, as have the cucumbers… which I over-planted and are going to need some serious thinning out. I’ve got two rows of corn coming up, and pumpkins starting in the back corner. I had a whole row of sunflowers, but something munched about half of them. The Amish melons just apeared, and I’m still waiting, hopefully, for the watermelons. I really, really, want some watermelons.
I’m thinking about putting in some zuccini and maybe some peppers–is it too late to try another round of lettuce? I’ve got a whole variety of herbs sprouting on the porch, and I’d like to keep them going throug...
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| Spider Spud |
| 2007-05-29 00:12:14 |
So Shana invited us to participate in her ward’s Potato Derby on Memorial Day. It was a sufficiently geeky activity–simulatneously intriguing to Cliff and I and completely repulsive to Megan, so I promised we’d go.
Only a group of Mormons could so enthusiastically embrace the idea of racing potatoes down an old Pine Wood Derby track on a holiday Monday. The turnout was impressive, the noise level ear-splitting, and the competition fierce.
The Henrichsens set about carving into a gigantic spud which they dubbed “Darth Tater”, complete with Darth Vader mask. It was awesome!
Megan and Hunter became my pit crew, and we peeled our potato down to the svelt Spider Spud you see here. Hunter made a pendant for us, and Meg supervised all our test runs (funny how she came around so quickly!).
When race time came, Darth Tater tore up the track–I think Team Henrichsen came in second or third overall! Spider Spud took second place in it’s first race a...
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| Pre-Memorial Day Picnic |
| 2007-05-28 01:10:28 |
Sunday afternoon couldn’t have been better for a picnic at the park. The day started off cloudy and a little bit drizzly, but by 11:30 or so the sun broke through. The temperature hovered around the mid-70’s, and a light breeze kept the bugs at bay. We headed over to the park with the Henrichsens right behind us and the Canas‘ following a few minutes later.
Our boys promptly took over the sandbox and began diligently building… a volcano? Or something. Whatever it was, Hunter was busy commanding the younger boys who followed orders obediently, reinforcing walls, fetching water, and digging, digging, digging.
Meanwhile, us parent-types chowed down on sandwiches and potato salad, deviled eggs and Korean ribs, chips and grapes and watermelon, cookies and soda and a whole lot more. We tend to over-do it at these family get-togethers. Three coolers, one picnic hamper, and several grocery bags of food really ought to be more than enough to feed six adults, ha...
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| No. 24 |
| 2007-05-25 16:12:15 |
My 14th nephew–one of 24 cousins on my side of the family–joined the ranks of giant Stout babies populating the world yesterday. Ethan Manning Stout, son of Aaron (my baby brother!) and Alice Stout, came out weighing a whopping 8 lbs. 15 oz. Poor Alice! Welcome to parenthood, kids!...
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| O Human Child |
| 2007-05-25 14:55:38 |
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world’s more full of weeping
than you can understand.
–William Butler Yeats...
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| House Resolution 333 |
| 2007-05-25 01:01:20 |
our YouTube Pick of the Week
On April 24, 2007, U.S. House Representative Dennis Kucinich introduced H.Res. 333, calling for articles of impeachment to be sent to the U.S Senate with regards to Vice President Richard B. Cheney.
If you believe that Vice President Cheney should be impeached, then vote “Yes” here....
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| Snot Factory |
| 2007-05-24 18:18:19 |
I am completely fed up with sniffling and snuffling my way through this monstrous cold that refuses–refuses!–to let go and let me breathe normally again. I’ve taken to carrying handkerchiefs with me (a habit of my husband’s that has been infinitely useful on too many occassions to number), and I’ve got three of them in my purse right now… all of them too damp to use anymore, and it’s only noon!
WHAT AM I GOING TO DRAIN INTO THIS AFTERNOON?!
Tissues are all well and good, except that I don’t have any with me, and the ones they supply here in the office are a bit too rough for my delicate and already raw nose.
Guess I’m going to the drug store at lunch time.
Cliff is still a bit snuffly too, but he’s complaining about it less than I am. Which makes me feel guilty for complaining… but not guilty enough to stop.
Megan isn’t so congested anymore, but she does have an ear infection, and is more or less deaf in one ea...
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