Sixty-seven

There is a duck who has made a nest under the edge of a large round hay bale, one of the many that's currently in our yard. Her feathers are about the same color as the hay, except for a flash of white and green. I almost missed seeing her, she was very well tucked away. I didn't get too close, I didn't want to scare her or frighten her away. Of course, now I will worry about her and her eggs. We have dogs and cats roaming around, after all. I'm going to pretend it's the same duck that I found in our basement last year (or was that two years ago?) as that makes the story better. She was so happy that we got her out without hurting her that she decided to come back and lay her eggs nearby.

An update on my cousin Alan's condition: he is alert, can eat solid foods, recognizes his family, and can speak (tho with some slurring). I haven't heard any update on his paralysis, so I have no idea if that will improve or if he'll remain partially paralyzed. Still don't know much about strokes, even tho I watched my Grandmother essentially disappear before our eyes when she had her first one. Or maybe that's why. I think I tend to avoid the topic.

We still have two kittens, Mama cat has relocated them to one of the smaller sheds now. The female has long hair, white with black and orange thrown in. I've been calling her Fluffernutter. The male has shorter hair, white with black and gray spots/stripes. Tried calling him KitKat but it hasn't stuck, will try coming up with something else. Have a feeling they'll end up being my outside cat family.

Another weekend flown past, very little to show for it. Didn't even really get to sleep in, either day. The wind woke me this morning. I really, Really, REALLY hate spring/summer storms, and am already sick to death of the wind. It just will not let up.

Sixty-six

Waiting to hear what's going on back east tonight; apparently my cousin Alan suffered a "significant stroke" today. He's about 44, 45 yrs old, too young for this. His older brother, my cousin Rocky, died in 2001, and their father, my Uncle Butch, died just a couple years ago. Not sure what is going on with that branch of the Zarrelli family but I don't like it!!

Other updates...we're looking forward to getting to meet Gabriella Arnold later this week. James and Kristal are in MO for a week (well, Kristal and Ella are, anyway) so we're meeting up with them on Thursday evening so that we can visit with all three of them before James leaves for work commitments.

[I bought a new book I'm thoroughly enjoying right now, Michael Palin's Diaries 1969-1979: The Python Years. I don't know what it is about diaries or journals, but I find them fascinating, and here's a very funny guy talking about a very interesting topic during a very interesting period of time.

We bought the movie Bolt recently for Seth. I'd had three or four people talk about how funny it is, especially the hamster, Rhino. I was underwhelmed, to say the least. The pigeons in that movie were funnier than Rhino, and that's not really saying much. I much prefer the penguins and King Julian in the Madagascar movies. And the fact that I'm arguing the merits of one set of animated characters over another is really peculiar, anyway...

What else. Uh...I finally got some "girl time" this past weekend with Wendy and Karla. We met up in Lee's Summit for lunch and some power shopping. It was much needed, appreciated, and enjoyed. We're next hoping to get together in May at Wendy and Andy's for a splash-in-the-creek day followed by a campfire and cookout. That's, uh, not just for the girls, by the way, that's for all of us. :o)

Some pics from Easter.

Sixty-five

Party Pics

Sixty-four

Gorgeous day, eighty degrees fahrenheit, March 17. Great for the drunks out in Westport tonight! Now, those were the days. Start drinking at 9:00 am, wind down around ... oh, 2:00 am. I'll bet Jenny's out there right now. All the single ladies, put your hands up!

We're having a party for Lacey's birthday this weekend, incredibly hard to believe she's turning 16. I've known her half her life now. The first time I met her was in a parking lot, I was meeting Brian and Lacey for Red Friday, and I pulled into the lot and parked and turned the ignition off and turned to open my door...and she was already standing at my window, checking me out. Funny kid. Good kid. Argues like a barrister, but good.

Seth is sitting across from me right now with dirty knees and a big scrape/bruise on his forehead (faceplant on the playground at preschool), checking for toe-jam. When we got home he jumped right in his jeep and cruised around the yard for about half an hour. Totally happy. That thing was worth every penny.

My rash is nearly gone, I'm happy to report. Just nearly.

Sixty-three

Spent a good part of my morning at urgent care again. Last night I started getting a rash on my chest and arms and face, and this morning it was everywhere, and my face was swollen. Got a steroid shot and a prescrip for prednizone, and some antihistamines. It has maybe started to go down a little, but not much. I have NO idea what's going on, an allergic reaction to something, but god knows what. I can't think of anything I did differently yesterday, didn't use any new soaps or lotions, didn't eat anything new or unusual.

Looks like MU just won the Big 12 championship. Woot! So much for the Baylor bandwagon. I read earlier that the arena wasn't even a third full, and scalpers couldn't get $10 for tickets. That's kind of ugly.

I downloaded the new U2 album over a week ago and still haven't listened to it. I don't know why not. AND, I don't even know what it's called or what any of the songs are. (When asked, I always say U2 is my favorite rock band. Does this now disqualify me from being able to say that...at least with a straight face?)

I'm sitting here typing this and watching Kate Hudson and Matthew McConaughey undressing each other. If that doesn't make you want to kill yourself I don't know what will.

Sixty-two

Another Friday rolls around. This time last week I was unconscious, I was SO sick last Friday. Dr said viral bronchitis but I don't think it could have been that. I've had bronchitis before and this wasn't anything like that. In any case, I feel better now.

My very good friends James and Kristal had their baby this week, Gabriella Jean. She'll be called Ella, I believe, and not Gabby, thank goodness. :o) Seth is very interested in her, we got to have lunch with them around the holidays and Seth thought the whole "she has a baby in her belly" thing was fascinating, so now that she's "out" he asks about her a lot. The inevitable questions are bubbling around in that active little brain of his, I'm sure.

MU won their basketball game last night, apparently. KU and KState both lost yesterday. Funny. Even funnier -- I don't care!!

Random pictures to follow...

Sixty-one

What? Where have I been? Oh, you know. Job. Husband. Kid. Freelance work. A house to keep up with.

We bought another cow this past weekend. What? Yeah, “another cow.” Now we’re up to three cows. We bought the first two around the holidays. Lucy and Ethel. The new cow is Roseanne. She has a heifer calf, her name is Darlene. What? Yeah, yeah. Television names. You noticed. Lucy and Ethel are both pregnant. If Lucy has a bull-calf, just guess what his name is going to be.

Uh…we’re starting with the prep for the Myrtle Beach trip. Seth is already talking about what he’ll wear. We priced airline tickets and discovered it was WAAAAY cheaper to fly to Charlotte than directly to Myrtle Beach. So we'll rent a car (we would have anyway) and drive down to the beach, it's about three, three and a half hours. For an old hand at car-trips like myself, that's a cake-walk.

Seth. Seth is good. I am finding, however, that the Fours are definitely worse than the Twos or the Threes. And when you’re dealing with a smart Four, you’re really in trouble. I don’t have any specific stories to pass along today, just suffice it to say he's got a huge vocabulary and he knows how to use it. He also knows how to use charm and dissimulation.

Also, in case anyone else was wondering but had never bothered to really find out, I just read a little about why February only has 28 days. Probably at some point in my youth we studied this topic, but I didn't retain the info. So...

When the Roman calendar was first created, it was established to keep track of the agricultural cycles of planting and harvesting. There were, initially, only ten months, March to December. But a guy named Numa Pompilius decided, around 3000 years ago, that a calendar that basically overlooked one-sixth of the year didn't really make sense, so he decided that a year should have 355 days...approximately the length of twelve lunar cycles. Extra days ("leap" days) were added to keep the calendar roughly in tune with the seasons, and January and February were added then (to the end of the year). Since Romans considered that even numbers were unlucky, he made seven months 29 days long, and four months 31 days long.

But, it turned out he’d need one even-numbered month to make it come out to 355 days. So February was picked, since, at that time, it was the last month of the year, and was “assigned” only 28 days. It wasn’t until a long time later that Julius Ceasar reorganized the calendar, bumped it up to 365 days, and moved January and February to the beginning of the year.