My new used shea butter

I told my husband I needed shea butter and he said he'd go by the natural foods store and pick some up for me. To avoid error, I wrote down on a piece of paper

shea butter,
refined,
100% pure,

and I told him don't buy it if it's not refined and not 100%. He bought me some!

But I open it up and it's half gone. Used. Used a lot. Who knows how many fingers have swiped through it or where those fingers have been. So yes, he bought me refined, 100% pure shea butter, but it's also the tester jar. It has a sticker on the front says

Tester

and I guess the cashier didn't notice it either.

Yesterday he sat in the chair and broke it. I've told him to quit throwing his body down when he sits and see, he shoulda listened to me. He steps heavily a lot too. When he steps out of the trailer he rocks the whole thing. When he steps down the three stairs in here, he rocks the whole thing. I tell him, hold in your abdominal muscles when you step and don't throw all your 200 pounds of weight on your feet. Does he listen to me at all? Nooo. And now the chair is broke.

But I got my torso harness for my camera yesterday (we mail order everything) and took the thing out and darn if I had any idea how to put it on. It holds the camera against your body so it doesn't tap, tap, tap on your tummy when you walk. You can hike more comfortably and it even takes some of the weight of the camera off of your neck. Here's a picture of a tuff girl modeling it. Her lens is a leettle (cough, cough) bigger than mine. I put that thing on ten different ways wrong. I'd have never figured it out. My husband fiddled with it and put it on me and fixed it to fit and now I like it a lot. He spent 20 minutes figuring it out! I'd have returned it if he hadn't helped me. Men have an eye for how things work and how things go together. My husband helps me a lot. I guess maybe it's a good trade-off...even it he does break chairs and buy me tester items at the store.

Categorius categories

Now that I can use labels for posts I need a real good system, as in logical. I detect there may already a problem with photos. I did Hair Photos but I also have a plain Photos label. I think I should divvy up Photos into maybe Landscape and People. No, too much detail. Or maybe it is a good idea. I have way more landscapes. I've begun a Religion label but have so few it would be easy enough to change. I'm not crazy about the word religion. I mean, yeah, I'm talking about religion but I the word doesn't say at all what I'm writing on. Hmmmm. How about Faith. That might be good. Descriptive words are needed, creative, yet not so creative that they lose the first time visitor. And then, how to possibly divvy up and classify the electrifying minutae of Daily Life. There exists a few diamonds amidst the rubble (I like to imagine), but how to select and pull them out? Hmmmm....

I'm gonna be a digital media babe

Got my book yesterday. Photoshop CS2 RAW by Mikkel Aaland. Heard the recommendation from Leo Leporte the Tech Guy on KFI FM - a radio show that we stream a lot. He's smart and knows all the newest and coolest info on 'puters.

I've been a travel babe, a photography babe, a middle eastern dance babe and now I'm going to learn to use RAW format and become a digital media babe. (My husband calls me that. For the record, I never walk around and refer to myself as any kind of babe. But I do like to use the phrase digital media now. Nice ring to that!) JPG format is about 2.5 megs and RAW is about 9.5 megs. RAW data is like a digital negative. It contains all the information just like a film negative does and you can interpret the data. It requires a lot more time for post processing, but I've learned that most of the photos that grab me...they've been post processed more extensively than I know how to do.

Soon I shall know ze secrets too!

Up for a BBQ over the lake?

Usually we have at least one camper in our loop, but we've had nobody for a whole week. It's a record! People from Texas can't get up here due to road closures. Desert people in the vicinity don't want to camp in the snow or drive on the roads. So it's just you 'n me here. You bring the hamburgers and I'll bring the makins'. It'll be fun. lol!

Roe v. Wade: 34th anniversary today

Blacks didn't choose slavery. Jews didn't choose genocide. And babies don't choose abortion. I was going to protest at the courthouse with an anti-abortion group at noon today, but the roads are closed down and schools and businesses are closed for the day. Next year.

Roe v. Wade passed by a vote of 5-4 on this day in 1973. I was 13. The vote of one man effected the outcome of the fate of 50 million babies to date, not unborn babies, dead babies. In 1973 no one knew what we know now.

See, when the United States chips away little by little at morality after awhile it all starts to fall away.

Dr. Jerome Lejune of Paris, a world renown geneticist who discovered the chromosome for Down's Syndrome said "Life has a very long history, but each of us has a unique beginning, the moment of conception." In 1973 it was believed that a newly conceived baby was nothing more than a blob of tissue. How far we have come since then!

The Georgia House of Representatives is preparing to challenge the 34-year-old Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion with a new bill that establishes an unborn child as a human person at conception deserving full protection under the law with no exceptions. I think it's time.

Psalm 139:13 in God's Word to the Nations says You alone created my inner being. You knitted me together inside my mother. The Bible rocks my world. You gotta read the whole chapter. Gotta!

I updated my blog. The bottom isn't finished so don't look down there. Sometimes in IE the bottom quarter of my header doesn't show unless I refresh. That's weird. It's fine in Mozilla. But then, in Mozilla there a glitch in my post list. One post title is partly on top of one above it. I've no idea why. I got a favicon to work in Mozilla though. Yay.

We've ordered a new modem. Well, reordered. The first one never came from the esteemed company of Direcway (said with great sarcasm). They've have the worst customer service to be found anywhere on the planet.

Where am I?

Where am I!? I'm one of a million who has a blog like everyone else's. Aaaaaugh!

I spent three hours the other day appending labels to all my hair photos. That's got to be worth something. See, they're right there on the right!

Updated

I updated. Got categories on my sidebar now, but had to lose my customized template to do it. So sad, too bad.

No campers in our loop

Except for us. It's a mystical, magical day. It's so beautiful! Merry Christmas!

End of our loop

Early this morning we walked here and heard coyotes not too far in the distance yapping away. We couldn't see them though.

Snow? Who says snow?

Weather.com is forecasting 100% chance of snow here between 3:00am and 11:00am. I have never heard of a 100% chance. Where's the chance in 100%? Our son is beside himself with excitement. Crazy weather, huh? It was darkish all day today. Kinda neat.

I washed my hair in our shower because it didn't get above the 30s today. It went okay. I wouldn't have thought I could do it, but I can do amazing things sometimes. That's a whole shower - with ten gallons of hot water. I amaze myself.

Went through my entire blog and labeled all my hair photos from the past two years. For some reason they only show up on the category page up to August 2005. Why don't the ones between November 2004 and August 2005 show up? They are definitely labeled. I double checked to be sure. So figured I need to change over from template to layout but...when I do that all my own HTML will be lost. In other words, my page won't look like my page at all. Sigh. I'm going to have to get over it and update to their new stuff eventually. The only reason I'd have learned Wordpress or Typepad was for the categories and now I can have categories but I'm going to lose the look of my site. Double sigh. And, labels are not a terribly useful feature unless they're on the sidebar for easy access and guess what. I gotta update to their new layout system to get that too.

Art Buchwald died. Great man. The New York Times has a superb video obit for him. He knew he was dying and they interviewed him. Art's opening line is priceless. It's so Art Buchwald. The video link is on the left, scroll down a bit. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/19/obituaries/19buchwald.html

It's early!

It's 7:00am! Am I the first one up?!

Hi ho hi ho, it's off to volunteer I go.

Today is Tuesday

It is cold here! It's 31 degrees and supposed to get down to 21. We're nice and cozy in here though. And! we have no electricity bill because we live in a trailer with hook-ups. Rah rah!

I just finished baking chocolate chip cookies (to go with the tuna sandwiches). The first two batches were burnt so I had to turn the oven down from the requisite 375° to 325°. I threw away the first batch but kept the second batch because in three days even burnt chocolate chip cookies might taste pretty darn good.

Does cold make you tired? Because I've been so tired three nights in a row.

People are paying our son for little odd jobs he does. They are so kind. Remember when he took care of Patches the Scary Dog? It was a bit of work you know, driving down there three times a day. For better or worse I've taught our son that when people give him money to refuse it; to say thanks but no thanks. Ninety-nine percent of the time folks insist on paying him and they love when he refuses it because most kids don't. He's real sincere! Well, he did like I taught him with Patches. The family offered to pay him, in fact they offered in the beginning, but when they came home and said they had to go to the bank, our dear son said, "No, no, no. I won't take money. I liked doing it." Bless his heart. But I admit, I didn't tell him but I was a little upset. However, it's been a couple weeks now and I know this family struggles financially and I'm sorry I was so greedy feeling. My son did a good thing when he refused payment. The husband works hard and the wife is a SAHM who quit a high paying, high powered job in the science field before they moved to this tiny town. Their life is much different than a few years ago. My son, he has a better heart than I have at times.

I skipped ladies Bible study tonight. My hair is dirty and I didn't want to go, not even in a tight bun. I didn't go to the showers today because the high was 37°. I'm tough, but not that tough. About 45° I can do. That's the lowest I want to be in. Our trailer shower doesn't have enough pressure for my long hair, only ten minutes of hot water, and the alternative, washing it in a pail, is a lot of bending over work.

My length is 35 1/2, so I'll be at least that for February 1 measure-in, although I'm doing my measure-in by myself now. I don't feel alone though.

New underwear

Today was busy. We worked in the Visitor's Center from 7:30am to 11:30am, came home and ate lunch and drove to Las Cruces. I went to Dillard's! I didn't know the sales would be so big. Sales everywhere. Shoes everywhere were killer cute, but alas I cannot wear pretty shoes in the dirt.

I got three p*nty/br* sets. Hopefully the asterisks in there will keep me off Google. All but one item was on sale. They're all pretty too. One set is PURPLE. One set is burgundy. One set is red and pink flowers and leopard print. My husband laughs and laughs at leopard prints but I like them. I would never have bought the leopard print set but the br* was only $9.99. How can I pass that up? Of course. I can't.

It seemed like we flew the whole the way home, 70 miles one way. Why is it the drive is so long getting there, but getting home is like the blink of an eye. Maybe because you are so happy with your new stuff.

Told my husband I blogged tuna fish sandwiches last night. I guess I've got him craving one now. He bought two big cans of albacore in spring water. Tomorrow guess what we're having for lunch.

Wanting

I want a tuna fish sandwich really bad - on soft, fresh bread, with a sweet pickle, a glass of milk, some chips, and homemade chocolate chip cookies for dessert. Only thing is, I'm not hungry. I had dinner and I'm not hungry at all so why am I thinking of a tuna fish sandwich?

Two good links

I have two links that are good. This first one one Mermayd sent me. Homeschoolers will recognize the story line in this cartoon video presentation on the topic of children. It's so well done. Click on the purple Animal School button.
http://www.raisingsmallsouls.com/

And this is from my sister. It's from CNN about a child prodigy. I enjoyed it. It's kind of a faith/art/kid based video.
http://tinyurl.com/yxewot

2007 Calendar

This is the calendar (thumbnails here) I put together. My sis asked for another copy and she's even going to pay for it herself!

Frequent readers will recognize all the photos exept for one or two.

I added captions to it. I'm kicking myself for not including captions to begin with. First thing my sister said when she got her calendar is "I miss the captions." I think I'm going to be hearing it a few more times in the next couple days...

(Update 1/13/07 - I added captions and ordered a few more.)

Scripture for every day living

Proverbs 11:13
Those who talk about others tell secrets. But those who can be trusted keep things to themselves.

Someone is sharing with me what someone else in the family says about me. As in somebody, told somebody, told somebody, told me. Puh-leeeze, don't involve me. I wrote the person and told her she has to quit doing that with me. Here I am way, way out in the middle of New Mexico. All I do is make a happy birthday phone call and I get all this rigamarole.

I feel pretty good anyways! And this song came to me. "The Joker" by the Steve Miller Band.

Lately, I've been coveting an Ipod just like Christina's. It's seems like a good thing to have. It's incredibly small and it holds a lot of music. Amazing!

Hi!

We're having awful terrible satellite outages. All night long even, and I hate that. My husband thinks our modem is dying and needs replacement.

One of my favorite things now is putting the truck in four-wheel drive and revving it up and pulling in the driveway. I do a small 360 in the dirt and bounce all around like a tuff grrrl and this way I can pull in straight instead of at an angle.

I'm loving my Tuesday night Bible study and I'm enjoying my Women of Faith discussion board. It's the only board I'm still visiting, but the real life study and online fellowship complement each other well. And tonight I even had déjà vu.

I know it has different definitions and some say it's just a blip in the brain, but I have always felt it to mean that I am in the place I'm supposed to be. I got it when I was typing a post to Kara and Fox, so I think I am supposed to know them. God sent them to me. Well, that's kind of dramatic and selfish sounding, but I'm glad I know them. I usually get déjà vu at a new job, so this is a new situation for me to get it.

The baby is doing much, much better! His daddy gave him his first bottle of mother's milk and burped him today. The baby's breathing is still sporadic, but much improved. I'll bet they will give him a date to go home soon.

I feel generally good. I feel almost euphoric for some reason. I jogged yesterday. I drank a glass of water today. Um, tomorrow I'm going to drink a whole lot more water. They say it's good for you; eight or nine glasses a day.

You should drink some water too.

You're tagged

Gotcha. Sorry. I got double tagged by Kim and Christina.

Five (5) Things You Don't Know About Me

How's a blogger supposed to answer this when everything a blogger blogs is something no one knows about them?

1) Folded over potato chips are my favorite and I always look in the bag and root around to fish them out first.

2) In 1990 I wore a pair a pretty thigh highs to work instead of pantyhose. They're so comfy because you don't have more stuff binding you at the waist, and they're beautiful. Unfortunately, I also used baby oil as my all over moisturizer that morning. A key point is that baby oil and "Stay Up" thigh highs really don't work well together. ...Parked my car, walking to work and, uh oh, one starts falling down. Then the other starts falling down. I mean, all the way down - they're flopping around by my ankles. A lady walked by me and I apologized to her. Realizing I could not walk into the office like this, cool as a cucumber I stopped at the corner stoplight (it was red anyways) and set down my lunch, my thermos, my folders and my purse, and slipped off the evil thigh highs and tucked them in my purse. At lunch I drove all the way home to fetch some pantyhose to cover my white, white legs.

3) In 1979 I had an abortion. My IUD didn't work. If anything the anguish and sorrow increases with time, not decreases. The knowledge that something safe in my womb - I had it killed - repulses me now. It is the greatest mistake of my life. At the time I thought I had no choice. I took a taxi to the hospital by myself. Abortion is not a federal or a legal issue. It's a moral issue. It should never have gone before the Supreme Court in 1973. Everything that makes a human being a human being is present from the very moment of conception. I don't need the Supreme Court to tell me what constitutes and baby and what does not. The Supreme Court is wrong.

4. In 5th grade we lived in El Centro (very low income, Hispanic/migratory population). Miguel Carrillo liked me best, probably because I was white and smart, and so the Mexican girly girls would follow me home after school, taunting me and threatening me the whole way because they didn't like that he liked me. The girls also hated me because I was the top grade 5 student. It was a rough year! I did comb my hair a lot too and they hated that. Haha!

5. I have a mole on my upper lip, left side, right on the lip line. I constantly bounce between thinking it is a pretty part of me or an ugly part of me. When I dance I think it is exotic and sets me apart. One day my father told me it looks disgusting like the third stage of cancer. My husband and son say it is nice and got upset when I mentioned removing it. Once a doctor said to me, "You don't want to take that one off, do you?" Maybe it depends on people and how they see you.

Inside thoughts

As opposed to outside thoughts. I have a few today. We had a satellite outage on Thursday night so I couldn't blog and last night my mind was too full to write. Now I have to catch up.

1. Someone found my blog through Google using "pics=little girls won't wear panties." This person gets one imprecatory prayer and one report of their IP address to the FBI from me. I'm into imprecatory prayers because I like to use the word 'imprecatory,' but I don't really do them.

2. It dawned on me last night as I was reading The Wedding by Nicholas Sparks, the same guy who wrote the fantastic chick movie, The Notebook, that my sister is my father's favorite. I'm okay with it. Honestly, I am. I love them both. My sister was a cute blue eyed, chubby, blonde baby and as a little girl, quite the cutie pie. Once some Iranian people who were fascinated by her complexion and hair gave her a toy pearl necklace. They ignored me. And my sister tells my father what he wants to hear. I don't. The last time he insulted me I called him on it and he phoned my sister to ask what he should do. He prefers to hear what she has to say because she will go to great lengths to smooth things over. I'm not very smooth.

3. I am an aunt again, fourth nephew, no nieces, but the baby is still in the hospital. Born at 8:01am on January 3rd, he has been battling fluid in his lungs. We have not been told when he can go home yet. His mother's arms are empty. He is on 100% oxygen. Improving, I think.

4. My new daughter-in-law-to-be was not altogether there with the dress I suggested for me to wear to the wedding. She said it was pretty but she'd show me what she has in mind if I wanted, and I said sure! Bring it on! I was excited to see what she had in mind. I showed the dress online to my husband and boy howdy, sometimes when a husband speaks you know there's no use arguing. This was one of those times. He bellowed, "We are not going formal!" Actually, I'm fine with that. I have no formal clothes at all, no accessories, no dressy shoes. How-some-ever, I, Liliana, get the job of communicating this to the bride-to-be. Also, I get to tell her that we're not attending the reception. The reception is being held in Tijuana. We just are not going to Tijuana.

So I emailed her and told her, gently, but straight up. I also told her we won't be going to the reception. And that I was sorry. I am, too. She replied with the sweetest, sincerest email. The ball is in my court again. This takes a lot of energy.

I will include a photo of the dress she had in mind. This dress, I would poke both of my eyes out with hot pokers before I would wear it. I'd never in a million years pick this style. This is a dress for a 60 year old woman and they've plopped a 20 year old model into it. It's all polyestery or organzanite or some such fabric. My husband says, just wear what you originally wanted to wear. But I ask you, is it that easy?

Which leads to the ultimate question, who am I? I've led myself to believe that clothes are not important. Two years ago I shed the whole empty facade of 'what I wear is what I am.' At least, I thought I had. I worked so hard at it, at least, I thought I worked hard at it. And I now face, of all things, a clothes problem. It's causing me consternation and worry. Haven't I moved up in the world at all? Is God up there enjoying watching me go in these teeny, tiny circles?

I think I'll just sink into a song. I used to really dig Courtney Love, but I've seen her face and I don't know her anymore. I would, but I can't link it to YouTube because the vid comments are full of foul language. Bummer.

"Doll Parts" from Live Through This by Hole

I am doll eyes
Doll mouth, doll legs
I am doll arms, big veins, dog bait
Yeah, they really want you, they really want you, they really do
Yeah, they really want you, they really want you, but I do too
I want to be the girl with the most cake
I love him so much it just turns to hate
I fake it so real, I am beyond fake
And someday, you will ache like I ache
Someday, you will ache like I ache

I am doll parts
Bad skin, doll heart
It stands for knife
For the rest of my life
Yeah, they really want you, they really want you, they really do
Yeah, they really want you, they really want you, but I do, too
I want to be the girl with the most cake
He only loves those things because he loves to see them break
I fake it so real, I am beyond fake
And someday, you will ache like I ache
Someday you will ache like I ache

The poor agave plant

I just realized I forgot to put a deer picture in the calendar. Too late! The ordering is done. I used an agave plant photo in its place because I overlooked the deer in my portfolio and though I am quite fond of the agave myself, I'll have to wait and see if anyone else appreciates it. The sky is pretty in the background.

This agave, a succulent, fits in the calendar because he gave all his moments to the creatures of the Sonoran desert. I guess he was very tasty. He's chewed up because the cottontails and the hares and I don't know what else nibbled at him every night. I went to see him this year and he's dead. Very, very dead. But he could have been magnificent. The Century plants, and I think that's what kind of agave this is, bloom once a century. I don't think he got a chance to bloom. The Sonoran desert can be a hard, cruel place.

My husband just asked why there are no captions under the calendar photos. I didn't add any this year. Oh noooooooo! I thought it looked nice without them but I suppose captions would have made it more interesting and personal. I didn't like how Shutterfly made them slightly indented instead of centered last year and it was doing the same thing this year.

Next year I'll do better. That's what I say now and next year I'll be exactly the same.

There exists an ode

I went to my friend, Eowyn's, blog tonight to do some catch-up reading. She wrote an ode to me. Can you believe it? Can't wait to tell my husband. He's sleeping right now. It's the oddest thing when I go to her blog because she sometimes writes about things I'm thinking about. It's just a little strange. Often I have to have my Merriam-Webster window open at the same time that I'm reading Eowyn's writing.

I had a friend named Marcie, and once when we were at the dining room table, Marcie said I have a beautiful face. I don't, but it's the only time anyone has ever said that to me, man or woman, and I about choked. Having an ode written for me feels much the same. It's is very nice. Things from the heart are the very best of all.

Tonight I just finished making our family 2007 calendar. It's not as good as last year's but I think peeps will like it. We spent a lot of the summer at the southern edge of the boreal forest and I hate to sound ungracious, but there's just a bunch of trees up there so I did not collect many amazing shots. On the cover I put a photo of my husband and son at the edge of the Grand Canyon. Our son has an expression that is priceless. I used a C.S. Lewis saying for the calendar front cover, "This moment contains all moments.” There is so much truth to that, isn't there.

Tim Herrmann from high school wrote me! No kidding. He's the first person to reply to my high school bio. How cool is that. I have to write him tomorrow. For now, I gotta go to bed. I barely finished my calendar at 11:59pm so that I qualified for the 20% discount. Yeah, I like to wait for the very last minute. It's a real motivator.

Women's group

Strange but true. I've joined a women's prayer group. They also study together. The book they (we?) have just started is How to Hear From God by Joyce Meyer. I looked at comments at Amazon.com and all but two are good. Generally when I read comments I quickly scan through all to find the lowest ratings to read why people didn't like the book. Two comments out of 18 were people who didn't like the book. One said that it's drivel and the other says it's "mindless dribble." Puh-leeze. If a critique doesn't articulate what stinks about the book then I really can't use the critique, can I.

A hardcore Christian metal band called Disciple is coming to town at the end of the month. I'm surprised any band would come here to play let alone one with a reputation. Disciple has been together for ten years. I found a little bit of their music at YouTube and I couldn't understand a word, but as a former headbanger I have to say I love their sound. It makes me feeeel so good inside. They have energy, tats, an abundance of raw testosterone, all things which I mightily love, plus some very fine metal thrash breaks. I may sit in the parking lot and bob my head. The pitiable sad truth is, I'm afraid to go listen inside because it may ruin my hearing. Really, I've listened to such loud music during my youth that I'm afraid I'll go deaf. I ordered a hamburger through one of those boxes once, Sonic Burger, and I couldn't understand a thing the order taker was saying. It was really embarrassing, like being an alien on another planet and you're trying hard to decipher what the heck they're saying, while you in the meantime look really stupid.

I didn't know that the phrase "still, small voice" came from the Bible. It's in 1Kings 19:12.

I'm so excited about the new year. I think something about it is going to be really good. I hope! I've been like a Christian on a tricycle for so long. Surely God will give me a two wheeler soon. Even if I have to have training wheels on it I'd be happy. He's got to be gearing me up to use me for something.

Social Security

Sometimes I'm like the person who's afraid to go to the doctor because they're afraid they'll be diagnosed with cancer, as if staying away from the doctor will keep the cancer away. A niggling worry has been eating at me; what would become of me financially if I were suddenly alone? Poverty is an equal opportunity employer. I went into a funk over it the other day.

So I got proactive and researched a bit about social security. A lot of women, me being one, drop out of the workforce to rear up children. Since I'm currently short enough credits to qualify for my own social security I will receive nothing when I reach retirement age. Our youngest son will be 18 when I'm 58 so it's entirely possible I may return to the workforce someday. If I had enough credits, but my husband's retirement was more than mine, I could receive 50% of his instead of mine. That's all moot at this point in time because I don't have the credits.

But, if my husband dies I would qualify for widow's benefits. That's different. In that case if I were to begin receiving benefits at the earliest age possible, age 60, I'd get the least monthly amount; 71% of my husband's full benefit amount. If I were to wait till my full retirement age, and me being born in 1959 makes age 67 and ten months full retirement age, then I would receive 100% of my husband's social security amount.

I feel much better. My husband earned six figures so he's at or very close to the very top of the benefits schedule amount. No one lives a high life on social security alone but if you live within your means you will not starve, so at minimum I will not starve. Plus I have my two sons so I will not be all alone in the world. But I want to be self-sufficient. I won't be a clinging vine to my children. I would send myself off on an ice floe before I'd be a clinging fine.

Of course don't remind me that social security's gonna fold by the time I'm old or I'll have to go into another funk. I am diminutive by nature so it's hard to imagine being alone. I am a wife and well suited to wifedom. But Reta is alone now, and it will happen to me someday too. I am not afraid. I am not afraid.

Headbands

"HEADBANDS aren't comfortable. Some sport plastic teeth as sharp as toothpicks. Others are so tight they could make your eyeballs bulge." An article at the LA Times The Look: First Grade Fabulous.

At the New Year's party

All I said was 'tv is evil' and everything went quiet!

The background story is, we have no television and people often find this fact fascinating. They wonder how we can live without television! We tell them we get plenty of news online so that immediately sweeps aside the foremost issue of keeping informed of local, state, national and world current events.

So someone asked me the question straight up, why, really, do I say no television in our house. And I responded straight up. I didn't sugar coat it. I said, "TV is evil." The room went silent. The whole house went silent. Well, the livingroom, the dining room and the kitchen to be exact. You could have heard a pin drop and they have carpet. After a few seconds, I laughed and said, "Did I say something wrong?" My face went red as a beet.

It's exactly how I feel at the crux of it. I do think wickedness can move through groups of people like radio waves that are unseen yet have a verifiable effect. Of course, I don't think history on tv is evil. I don't think nature shows are evil. But I think there is enough low quality content just between the shows, let alone the shows themselves, to warrant watchfulness for ourselves and protection for our children. You are what you think, and what are you when you spend time watching material that is of no value added to your life. Programming that purposefully appeals to the basest parts of our nature is more and more common. A small, select group of people sits around and thinks up these shows for you to watch and they earn a whole lot of money when you watch them!

I heard this today. A year from now you'll be exactly the same as you are right now except for the books you read and the people you meet.

I'm just trying to be the person I want to be. I used to complain about the garbage on television and how bad it's gotten since I was a kid yet I watched it all night sometimes. In the morning I'd wonder, why did I do that! I just fell into it. I looked forward to doing nothing. When I worked I had a supervisor who had no television and secretly I admired her, though I thought her a little weird for having no tv.

My husband was sitting beside me and he knew exactly what I was going to say when the pointed question came. lol! He didn't even roll his eyes. I love him because he does not shame me for how I feel and how I express myself.

Hey, just tryin' to keep things lively!

A New Year's from a person with issues

Do you need a good laugh?  I sleep late and usually miss all the dramas of life. But here I am up early on a Sunday morn and I came across, what?, a locked thread on one of the hair care forums. Locked threads draw readers like bees to honey. This locked thread is one for the history books. I'm still cracking up over it. I think even my husband will get a kick out of this one. Here it is:

Cleaning "house" for the New Year

The last post I made to this group was back in August. I was treated like troll, despite the fact that I've been posting here for a while. The biggest insult actually came from a moderator, (name deleted by Lil). The thread is entitled "a head shaving for real" It is closed now or otherwise I would've reposted it.

Since that day I've stopped coming here and now being New Years I am cleaning out my bookmarks, but of course I can't just bow out gracefully, that would be too good for you people.

I have never in my life seen such a bunch of rude, self-centered, and hateful group of people as there are here. You all got your head stuck in a bottle of conditioner you can't see straight! Most people I know grew their hair long, washed it, conditioned it and let it dry. You people with your $100 Hungarian Hair Food and your $200 Llama Hair brushes are insane!!! Get a freaking life for goodness sakes!! IT"S HAIR!! you bunch of wackos! The fate of no one's world, even your own, relies on the condition of your HAIR!

I know a post like this will get me thrown out of here and my IP banned, but I say don't bother! I am never going to post in this place again! People at a Pro-Islamic Fundamentalist forum are friendler than you people.

Farewell all you ****-tards!

WHAT? The fate of no one's world, not even my own, relies on the condition of my hair!? Any longhair knows there's not a lick of truth to that.

And now where do I find this $200 Llama hair brush!

Saturday, yay!

Free to do whatever I want today!

It's very cloudy outside. They've been forecasting weather coming in for a week, but it's hasn't materialized. Son is hoping for snow of course, but he hoped for snow in Southern California too. He hopes for snow everywhere! I heard there were a few flurries early this morning but I was snoozin'. My husband keeps telling me to look at the sunrise and I keep saying it's not the one, and his voice goes up a few octaves and he says, "What? That's not a great sunrise!" lol! Yeah, it's great, it's just not so photogenic.

My dad went home yesterday and was pale and weak. He slept for four hours and my step-mom said he didn't move. She was worried. Then he woke up and had his color back and ate some food and his spirits were up again. I guess he hasn't had any good sleep for a week. Today he woke up and asked for breakfast and that's a good thing there.

I've disabled comments because they've plum wore me out! I want to come to my blog for R&R and feel peaceful and be able to practice here. I'm the kind of person who takes forever to compose a simple comment. Isn't that pathetic. So since I cannot return comments I'm going to disable them, so I don't feel like I have bad etiquette.

I need some new colors around here too.

Did you know

It is impossible to lick your own elbow. Go ahead. Try!

You can lead a cow upstairs but not downstairs.

Coca-Cola was originally green.

State with the highest percentage of people who walk to work: Alaska

Percentage of Africa that is wilderness: 28%
Percentage of North America that is wilderness: 38%

A duck's quack doesn't echo, and no one knows why.

111,111,111 x 111,111,111 = 12,345,678,987,654,321 (This one's for Yr.)

The phrase "rule of thumb" is derived from an old English law
which stated that you couldn't beat your wife with anything wider than your thumb.

These were in our local newspaper this week and I found them online too!

2:36 pm and it's a bit o' all right

Dad ate lunch, is upbeat and doing well. My sister talked to him. I'm gonna go call him now. She said they put in the biggest stent they make. Heh. I think he's lucky.

Back in '81 before the media was splashed with what all the symptoms of a heart attack are, he felt funny and left work and drove himself to the hospital. His left arm went numb on his way there - a classic symptom of heart attack. He's been on meds ever since. He has a good sense of how his body feels. At first the doctor sent him home with Previcid Tuesday and my dad said it didn't help and the doc told him to go to emergency the next day. I'm not overly thrilled with the doctor, but I'm thrilled with how my dad is in tune with his body. That's how you have to be. Doctors don't know everything. We each have to have a sense of our health ourselves.

10:24 am

My step-mom called. My dad is being prepped for surgery. They enter through the groin area and will look to see if there is any blockage. If they find one they'll put in a stent. Heart. Apparently he started feeling bad before Christmas dinner. Doc says he'll be fine and live to 101. Step-mom says my dad has not been feeling so well for a few months.

I have not one, but two herpes sores on my upper lip, one very big on the right and one small on the left. They're not scabs yet, just swelled up and white and ugly. It's either from having Christmas company or talking to my Dad on the 23rd (he sounded fine if not overly jocular). Or it could be from the formal wedding upcoming in April, or it could be that one day my husband will die and I will be alone. Not only alone, but weird because when I'm with him I'm normal and better than myself, and without him I'm just me.

21 days at half staff

When a president dies, flags are flown half staff for 21 days.

When we drove by our old house last year we saw the tenants left the flag up. They never take it down. My husband put up a 25' flag pole for me in about 2000. If you leave the flag up at night it's supposed to be lighted. If it's not lighted it should be taken down and folded nightly. If we go by again this year I'm walking right up to the porch and taking that flag down myself. It was tattered and faded and getting no love. I wish I had taken it down last year.

I don't think Ford was much as a president. He was pretty unremarkable as presidents go. He sure lived a nice, long life though. Ninety-three years old. Not bad!

I have yarn

Since we had to get up at 7:00am to feed the animals we decided to drive straight into Las Cruces instead of coming back home. I went to Hobby Lobby. Found no yarn I wanted. Went to Unraveled and found some pretty purple acrylic yarn for only $4.99 each for 100 yards, plus 20% after Christmas sale. I bought two. I've wisened up (I made up a word) and now know not to buy certain things like novelty yarns at Unraveled because their mark-up is ridiculous. Little did I know on my first visit that the $10.99 Eros ladder yarn could be bought online for less than half that. Ouch. Live and learn. But the hand dyed and animal fur yarns are probably worth the extra cost. I don't need fancy schmancy now though. This acrylic yarn I bought was going like hotcakes. People are making afghans with it and it's nice and soft. I touched this yarn by Plymouth called Oh My! and it's real soft. I'd like to use some of that for something sometime.

We ate McDonald's in the morning and I had a bacon cheeseburger and onion rings for dinner at 3:00pm. It's almost 11:00pm and I'm not hungry at all. We don't eat like this very often so it was kind of a treat.

I'm working in the morning so I have to go to bed now.

I got new reading glasses for $5.00. They're 1.75 power. Such a deal. I'm going blind. My night vision is gone. The other night I was walking with some friends and I almost fell down. I couldn't see the ground in the night time. It's disconcerting. I tripped but I didn't fall. Would have been very embarrassed if TIMBERRR, I fell all the way down. They got a flashlight when I had to go back to the truck. My new glasses are sort of a gunmetal color, brownish? I have to make an eyeglass necklace to hold them. I hope I have just the right beads.

Last night our guests brought us gifts. I was thinking, oh nooooo, because I didn't get them anything so it feels a little awkward, yes? But guess what they gave us: paper plates, paper bowls, plastic forks, knives and spoons - in a flower motif. Haha! It was so cute and I had fun opening each gift! They know we can't add weight and 'things' to our trailer - no space. So I acted excited and like each gift was exactly what I wanted and we all laughed! Pat is such a giver. She loves to give people presents.

I'm going to have really nice dreams of my yarn now. I'll take a photo of it tomorrow.

Yesterday morning

I'm putting up my practice shots till I get the one. Am kicking myself for being too cold to get my camera out on the day when the view was magical a week ago. I'm getting up early to get these morning shots. On this one I wish I'd done bracketing so I could brighten up the island. It's too dark. Uh, I don't know how to do bracketing yet.

I admit, I had a real nice Christmas. We had Turkey a la King over rice and fruit jello with whipped cream for the holiday meal. We had friends over and they brought the dinner. Good deal there. If you can find company who are good cooks who will bring food to your house and leave you leftovers too, go for it! I made the dessert. I forgot to buy whipped cream and the store was out so we drove to our guests house and got some from their trailer. It was real cream so I had to whip it with sugar and vanilla and I had to whip it a long time to get it fluffy. My arm got tired. I think I will never eat Dream Whip again. The real thing is much tastier.

I printed out a few Christmas songs like The Little Drummer Boy and everyone enjoyed a sing-a-long without music.

Tomorrow we're going to Las Cruces. I get to buy yarn! I want to make another scarf. My sister liked hers a lot. She emailed me and what she wrote made my night. Says she's going to wear it with the tag attached. Heh. I think I could get into giving handknit gifts.

My husband asked me what I wanted to get for our eldest son for a wedding gift. I've known from the beginning but I've been waiting for him to ask. And he said okay. I was surprised. He never tells me no, but I thought this might be the time he says no. I was prepared for a no, you never know when it can come, so I am happy with his answer.

Patches is smiling

This is Patches the dog - the dog I was scared to death to visit. He looks ferocious and ready to attack. But he isn't! Truth is, he's totally mellowed out here, sitting in the sun taking in the fresh air (it's windy), and his teeth are stuck on the outside of his lips. I thought it'd be a good photo to denote my initial fear!

He's getting used to us. Tonight when we brought him in the house for the night he was bounding about the kitchen with unmitigated happiness. It was so cute. I don't know why he was so playful and happy unless he's just happy to see our son. Patches is used to his family being home most of the day so he must be some kind of lonely.

I'm having an email fight with my sister about punctuation and quotation marks. Usually punctuation goes inside the quotation marks, unless the question or exclamation applies to the entire sentence and not just the quote. Told her I'm going to put her in my grammar zulu head hold if she doesn't quit placing her periods outside her quotation marks. I'll do it too. I'm bigger than she is.

Drove around and looked at Christmas lights tonight. Pretty.

Tomorrow is the day. I wish I could go from October 31 directly to January 2, but we have a kid. Have to do it. We didn't do Advent except for the wreath this year and husband and son both expressed disappointment. I should have done better. I got mad because I lost my file folder and I was too angry to find something else to use. I was angry because I feel my husband doesn't have any idea how much work I put into putting Advent together to make the verses and the songs and the reading and the ritual a perfect fit for us. Been doing some of the Book of Luke instead of my file folder stuff. I'm going to print out the Luke verses and use them next year. Fox shared it with comments and everything and it's really good and most of them are on my desktop already. I should have done better for this year though.

I'll be glad when plain days are back again.

Major cutback

Man, I have to cut back on my 'puter time. Yesterday I popped a tv dinner in the oven and forgot to turn the oven up to temperature (for the third time). I forgot to close the ceiling vent which caused the furnace to run a lot last night and uses up propane. Went to bed and left the space heater under the table. That might be a fire hazard, hmmm?

I must chop my forum time. That's all there is to it. Less time on photography talk, travel and rving talk, hair talk, news, email, amazon.com, theology, homeschooling, blogs, knitting and beading. Bummer. Huge bummer! But evidently it's absorbing my mind and attention too much away from tasks at hand. Notice I didn't list blogging. Surely I can blog and think at the same time?

Sunrise

Jack passed on last night. We'll miss him. From what Reta said when I visited her this morning, it was without pain. It was faster than anyone would have thought. When the medics said his pulse was gone she cried, "But he needs one."

I asked Reta if she sensed yesterday before it happened that it was going to happen last night, and she said no. He did not have time to be afraid and of that I'm glad. Jack didn't want to die in a hospital and that's why they're here. He had DNR 'Do Not Resuscitate' orders. I wanna go the same way - home, by the lake, with the desert, away from the hospital. They're Seventh Day Adventists.

It happened right after the Christmas potluck. Only ten minutes later we drove to Patches' house and saw the ambulance in front of Reta and Jack's motorhome. A park ranger was there. A few other cars too. I didn't stop because I didn't want to be in the way and I despise looky-loos. We prayed. When my husband was lying in the street after a car accident there were looky-loos crushing in a circle to see some blood and I wanted to thrash them all.

Reta looks real pretty today and she's all put together. I saw her this morning at 7:00am standing outside in her long red robe, staring into the air. We waved to her. As I write this now, I realize she must have been outside to see the sunrise; the first sunrise without her Jack. She got three hours rest last night and I think she expects a busy day. Reta's not a crier or a whiner. I want to be like her. She tells me I better learn to drive the truck and pull the trailer. She can drive their huge motorhome with a tow vehicle behind. She was out of Kleenex so my husband went to the store and bought her two boxes.

Mourning Dove

Keeping warm. That's why he's puffy.

Patches

Wednesday night I went over to meet the dog our son is dog sitting and get instructions about how to feed him, two cats and one kitten. I went home and felt sick to my stomach because I got scared of the dog! I worried about it all night long. I didn't sleep all night, I kid you not, and Patches grew bigger and scarier in my mind until by morning he was big as a horse.

He was really nice when I met him outside once about a month back. I petted him and he's a big dog but I didn't feel afraid. Then one day I went to their front door and Patches barked and lunged at the front window like he was going to eat me up. I didn't like that. I told the owners he scared me and they said that's what he's supposed to do.

I know how hard it is to get animal care when you go on vacation and when they asked our son to dogsit I easily said, "Fine!" I didn't think I'd have to do anything. Our son sees the dog frequently and they get along swimmingly and with two sons in Patches' family age 4 and 11, I considered him safe. Plus, with a doggie door what's the big deal? Just feed the whole crew twice a day and scoop the kitty litter box and our son has his first paying job with responsibility.

But when I went over to get instructions, Patches the dog was very standoffish. Nervous. He made me nervous. And he barks. He barks giant barks incessantly. And my greatest tactical error, there is no doggie door. Isn't there some saying about assuming things? I was dying on my way home thinking about what I'd gotten myself into.

So we're getting up at 7:00 am and driving over to feed him and the two cats (the third kitty is in the hospital for gall stones) and going back at 4:30 pm to feed them and going back at 8:45 pm to let them in the house to sleep for the night. It's a three minute drive, but geez. It's cold out and I'm never up this early anymore. This morning was 25°.

My fear has subsided considerably. Still, I don't make any sudden motions! He does bark a lot and he is scary and big, but they say he was abused before they found him. In just two days he's gotten used to me. I always tell him to sit and I give him a tidbit so he's cool with that. He waggled his tail and came by and let me scratch him this morning. He still barks terribly, but I think he's an angel of a dog. I wouldn't want to see him in a kennel because I don't think he'd do well, so I'm happy to do something that enables him to stay in his home. If ever imprecatory prayers are prayed I think it should be for animal abusers. This dog had to have been treated real bad, real bad before they found him at the shelter. I'm so glad this gentle, loving family has adopted him. He has an excellent home for life with them. Surely there must be a hot place in hell for animal abusers. There's just got to be.

No one at e-Bay has responded to tell me what the return policy is for that dress yet. I bet she's on vacation. I hope I'll hear from her!

Last night I dreamt about myself. That's weird. I dreamt I was sitting in a car and I was looking out the side window and saw myself at age 15 walking by outside. I said, "Look, look, it's me." Next thing I was holding the hand of my 15 year old self and looking at it. I thought the hand felt so small, looked so young, and the temperature of my younger self's hand was a little too cool. It should have been warm. I had the Farrah Fawcett hair style (which I really did have when I was 15) and I (my current self) started to cry. Don't know if it was about the hair or not. Haha! And I told my younger self everything was going to be okay - trying hard to impress her with my sincerity. She seemed empty and distant, not hearing me and she didn't look at me. End of dream. I'm sure I dreamt of that period in my life because I've been emailing with a newfound (refound?) friend from high school.

Tonight we're going to a potluck. My husband is making barbequed ribs and deviled eggs.

Gunne Sax

Remember Gunne Sax dresses. I had one. They were so pretty.

Tonight I've been informed that our son's April wedding is to be formal. That's not what it was going to be before now. Our youngest will be the ring bearer. The men have to wear tuxedos and I have to wear formal. I would run my regular three screams, but it will do me little good.

I don't think the bride will want me to wear a sari which I've wanted for a long time and is something I might wear more than once. I'm guessing she will rather I blend nicely. It's her day so I should oblige. Well, I can't wear polyester. I just can't. And I'll never wear anything formal a second time, so I detest the idea of investing much capital in a garment. I'd like to wear jeans and a Victorian punk jacket and lacy shirt, but that ain't happenin' either. So what about a vintage dress. Well even in vintage it's really hard to find something formal or formalish that covers up a lot of the top part. I'm a mother and I can't be wearing a sexy dress to my kid's wedding. It'll be April which may be cool weather, so I need to be covered. I found a possibility.

I found the perfect Gunne Sax dress at eBay. It doesn't tie in the back. Ties are too young for me now. It's not too open up top. I definitely look good in an A-line dress. I have not much waist and an A-line gives me a great waistline. I have reservations about the big ruffle on the bottom. It's the best I could come up with tonight. Sigh.

So did I ever say that my mom's best girlfriend in high school was a girl named Doris. Yeah, my mom and two other girls were the bestest of friends - a threesome. Lila was the other girl. Anyway, Doris's initial are DK as in DKNY. She's it. The real thing.

My mom said Doris was a talented seamstress and that an old lady saw her talent. The old lady, who rented a place to Doris and a roommate, paid to send her to some clothing design classes. Doris had no one else to lean on or to help her. Guess all the rest is history. Just goes to show how the action of a giving heart can blossom into something real big and pretty. My mom recently talked and exchanged photos with Doris. I asked my mom if she knew how big DKNY is and she said, yup. Doris is in the money.

Little gal from San Diego back in the day makes it big. I had one of her outfits once. Pink and white checkered culottes and a white tee shirt top with pearl edging and a coordinating suit jacket. Sounds ghastly now, but it was cute at the time.

I received a Kara Treatment Package!

Today I was gifted by my online girlfriend, Kara, with a box of her own homemade, natural beauty products. She makes these! Is that not the handwriting of a creative mind on those containers? If only I had a scratch and sniff page, then you could smell the fabulous fragrances wafting from these jars and bottles into my trailer when I opened them.

The face cream is lemony and I have some on my face now. I'm going to use the foot butter tonight. I don't know if Kara knows, but I'm a maniac about soft, smooth feet. The first time we went on an extended camping trip I went home with feet like chicken feet. I said to myself 'No more of this!" If I live in a trailer I am going to have the soft feet. And usually I do. I didn't know it, but my husband was watching me and I found out he put Vaseline on his feet a few times to soften them up. Heh. Yeah, they're watchin' ya all the time even when you don't know it, so look out. So tonight I'm slathering on my new foot butter then I'm putting thin cotton socks on to let the butter do its thing.

So you might wonder just what the ingredients are in these lotions and potions. Well, I know some of them:

Lavender Lotion: coconut oil, shea butter, aloe vera, grapeseed oil, lavender essential oil (and additional ingredients unknown except to She Who Formulated It).

Face Cream: same ingredients as Lavender Lotion, but a higher percentage of oils and butters used, plus Lemongrass essential oil.

Foot Butter: coconut oil, lanolin, cocoa butter, herbal oil, beeswax, lemongrass essential oil, tea tree essential oil, and peppermint essential oil. Excellent for use on dry heels and sore feet. May be used not only on feet, but extremely dry hands too.

Deep Condish: shea butter, coconut oil, jojoba oil and lavender essential oil.

I've admired the shine in Kara's hair for a long time, and now (wringing my hands together with glee) I hope to duplicate said shine by using this Deep Condish that she uses. I hope, I hope, I hope it works for me. The air is so dry that I applied a light bit already although she applies it on say, Friday, and washes on Sunday. I wash less often so I put on less, plus I want to see how it works in a small amount. Plus, I hate to use it all up in one application.

I'm working in the office tomorrow from 8:00 to noon. I have a new top to wear too. It's red. Usually I won't wear red but this top fit so well I had to buy it. Plus it was on sale.

Hopefully, tomorrow, shiny hair and a pretty outfit. Should be a good day.

If you read this, thank you Kara. I'm not worthy, but I am happy! You have email from me too. Mwah!!!

Windy today

It was really, really windy today. I like the desert wind.

My husband slept poorly last night. He was tossing and turning and breathing funny all night and kept waking me up, so that means I slept poorly too. I didn't want to go to church with bags under my eyes but as per usual, once I was there I was glad I went. This church meets at the crack of 10:00am and my eyes are barely open at 10:00am. I like my new home church so much! It's a non-denominational charismatic church.

I have a new kitchen faucet. Husband put it in this afternoon. It's shiny and makes me feel like I'm in a real house.

One of the rangers here has a talent for jewelry making. I just found out about it. His website is awesome. His prices are awesome. High! He works with silver and gold and his talent is remarkable. Take a look if you care to at http://www.benhoffacker.com/ He's a really neat guy and so nice. He has a new sailboat and he might take us out sailing one day, he says. Of course, today was very windy. I already said that. And I like the desert wind a lot.

Scarf for my sister

Taa daa! It's blowing in the wind. The tag I made to go with it is below. It's garter stitch which means all knit stitches. Reta said I better learn to purl soon.

Tag

Sun spots

Apparently there's a lot of radiation out in space the last couple days. Our satellite communication has been slim to none during the day and zip at night. The scientists have got to be informed that Liliana has a blog to keep up. I can't have sun spots, flares, solar wind, and coronal ejections interrupting and complicating my journaling activities.

Okay. A quick update. We went to Las Cruces on Wednesday. I found the cutest '70s style suede coat for the four year old daughter of our favorite park ranger. It's so cute. She's so cute. She says she's into 'fashion.' My, my. So I went to the girls clothes department at Dillards. I never get to buy little girls clothing! It was very fun and took me all of three minutes to find the perfect coat.

At the Luminaria I babysat her for about 15 minutes. I was worried because at age four my son would never be still. She sat next to me the whole time. Never got out of her chair. I was so surprised. We talked. She decided since I had no gloves on that my hands must be cold (they weren't) so she held my hands in hers and rubbed them for a few minutes. I was moved. Her mamma must do that for her. She told me Santa has chocolate cookies. Hehe!

And what's up with matching bra and underwear sets at the mall? Gorgeous, feminine brassieres with big, giant coordinating underwear. You can't wear giant waist high panties with jeans. You can't have panty lines either. And if you can't buy the set together, what's the point of matching? I didn't buy any. Drats.

I knitted a scarf for my sister for Christmas. This one I finished in three days. Fast, huh! It's just like mine but narrower and with fringe and no pockets. So, I guess it's not just like mine, but it's cute. Today I'm figuring out how to attach the fringe. I have to wait for Reta to come home so I can borrow a crochet hook hopefully. Seems I've lost mine and I haven't even used it once.

Today is Friday, December 15th, 2006. Something has to be done about this.

Our picture is in the paper!

One of joys of small town living is that you can be in the newspaper! I've never been in the paper before. My son and husband have been in the paper once in Southern California, but never, ever me. Our weekly edition of the newspaper was just delivered to our doorstep and we're in it! Here's the caption...

PREPARATION - With folded sacks in hand, the 20 plus volunteers of the local state park filled each with sand and a candle and then lined them up in preparation for Saturday's Luminaria Beachwalk and Floating Lights Parade. [Our son] is shown strategically placing each sack as the other volunteers, including his mother, Liliana, shown above, bring him the readied sacks.

How 'bout that. I'm famous! Well, we're famous. Heh.

Test shot numero uno!!!

Yeah, I finally took a picture. Got the circular polarizer in the mail today. This is outside our trailer about 4:15pm. We had unusual clouds today. I'm bowled over. I'm going to have a meltdown! Just think about when I find a really good view somewhere. Oh boy. Today I only used automatic. Soon I will learn to do my own settings. The click of the camera is much bigger than what I'm used. It's more solid. And there seems to be no shutter lag. No shutter lag? Oh happy day!

Now to figure out how to delete them. And I set the clock but apparently I didn't set set it because it's all zeros again. Only took me 20 minutes to do that. This dSLR is heavy compared to my S2 IS. I shall develop a very strong arm! I also have a cute backpack day pack that holds the camera and lenses at the bottom and you can put lunch or your jacket in the top part. I want to be self-sufficient you know. I don't wanna be saying "Honey, will you carry this for me, please?" all the time. My husband carries everything already. He says when we go hiking, "What am I? A burro?!" hehe!

The backpack is a good style I think because it doesn't look like a camera carrier. Once, at the airport, I saw a bag that was clearly marked "FECAL MATTER" DO NOT TOUCH. And you know what? I think it was camera equipment now. Pretty tricky person, huh? Well, I didn't realize how expensive camera things were. Now I understand why someone would do that.

Test shot #2

Wow. You can see the roughness of the paint at the base. You can even read the writing and this was taken handheld - no tripod! I'm learning to use Photoshop CS2 unsharp mask which is a digital darkroom thing. In the olden days (what, ten long years ago?) to sharpen a blurry photo they sandwiched the photo between an oversharpened image and a blurred image so the middle image came out sharper. Dunno how that works but that's what I read. Photoshop does it digitally. I overdid it a bit because you can see a bit of a halo thing going on at full size.

3,500 luminarias and I'm beat

This was the week-end of the Luminaria. They're big in New Mexico. A state park in the area puts out luminarias for a beautiful Christmas time celebration each year. Local businesses and families set up campsites and decorate their rigs with lights and Christmas stuff, they put out loads of home made foods, free food I'm tellin' ya (some people give donations though), and boats in the lake are dressed up in their Christmas finery and float in a boat parade. It's a sight to see.

Friday afternoon we and 20 other volunteers scooped sand into paper sacks, placed a candle inside each, pulled the wick straight on each candle, and set them aside. Saturday morning we set them out in the park along the roadway, around sites, and one mile in each direction outside the park approaching the entrance. Before dusk, my husband and I lit all the luminarias on the highway outside the park. 'Twas a bit of a walk and farther than I thought! Those paper sacks went way down the road as far as the eye could see. Saturday night we were at the state park campsite to dish out food and chat with visitors.

There were 3,000 visitors last year. More this year but I don't know how many yet. All totaled we volunteers put out 3,500 luminaria. Do volunteers rock or what!

Nothing exactly hurts but my back is achy what with all the bending over. I was lucky too. Instead of a butane barbeque lighter which is brutal for lighting a few hundred candles inside lunch sacks, I had a butane torch. Yeah baby! I torched those candles alight.

It was fun. I can't wait to do it again next year. But it will be fine with me if I don't see another paper sack until then!

Took a nap

Today I spent two hours reading the owner's manual for my new camera and looking at the lens, the camera body, the batteries and charger, all the buttons, and screens, and dials. Then I went and took a nap.

A fluffy bangs question from Sandra

I have lurked at your page for a while and I finally have to make a comment. Your hair is gorgeous! I have lots of gray that I choose to hide but your pics make me wonder if I should just let it all grow out.

I have to ask you though, I have read in other posts that you do not wash your hair everyday, so how do you keep your bangs looking so nice and fluffy? If I don't wash my bangs at least every other day, they start to get the greasies. Please share your secret;-)

-Sandra

Hi Sandra! Thank you for reading my blog and I'm so glad you commented!

My bangs get greasy too and though I don't wash my hair daily [drum roll] I do wash my bangs daily. I wash about once a week and when I wash I'm really ready to wash. But every morning I wake up and the bangs are going the wrong way. They look a fright. It's amazing how washing just the bangs improves the whole picture.

I blow dry them which takes about 60 seconds because my fringe is light. I use a round brush to give them a curve, but then I follow that with blowing them straight down because I don't like an obvious curve. One of the first things I did when I decided to leave my hair long is I thinned out my bangs. It was a drag at first but now that section has grown to about half of my full length. I sometimes wash the very front of my hair also - around my ears and top of head. Anything to avoid a whole wash.

I'm so glad you're questioning yourself about letting your silver show. Questioning is a good. I used henna till I just couldn't anymore because I had too much silver. Why I'm all for doing whatever it takes to feel beautiful. It's important. No one wants to walk around and feel ugly.

On rare occasion I've been the recipient of wonderful compliments on my silver from very young women. I think there are some young women who see something beyond the facade! I've also been snubbed once by a group of women my very own age, and at a Bible study no less. You can't let yourself be overly sensitive if you go silver, that's another thing. It's not the fashion, though I think there may be a wave of women changing that soon.

These are my thoughts on the subject. You have to have some power behind you to let your silver shine. My dad tells me I'd look better if I'd color my hair. I don't think so. I told him so. You only need one person to support you and for me that person is my husband. The hair boards are a great place for self-affirmation too.

There is one passage on Eowyn's blog that I found that you might find interesting. She typed in some parts of a book she read that were her favorite. Scroll to the bottom of the page and read the last two paragraphs that she put in bold. It's a great comment about grey hair!

I know you weren't expecting such a long answer. Heh.

~Lil

I got a one inch trim today

Messing around with new sig possibilities for 2007.

I got my hair trimmed today. Ivan did it for me. And he didn't charge me! Is that sweet or what. He took off an inch and sure enough it was damaged and needed to go. Good-bye and good riddance. I feel like a new woman. I feel like I have a brand new 'do! I could have spent $200.00 to feel this good but it didn't cost me a dime. I gave him a big tip though. Well, okay. I gave him five bucks. I sure like Ivan.

There was a kid about 13 years old getting a hair cut. Evidently he got the boot that afternoon from the public middle school for having long hair and his mom brought him straight to the barber. His hair was on the floor by the time I arrived. I sat down and then noticed he was about to jump out of his skin. He was upset about getting his hair cut. So the barber finished and when the kid got up, first thing he did was swish his hair (what was left of it) into his eyes. He's a skater and I'm guessing here, since I'm completely out of the what's-cool-teen-loop, that hair in the eyes is all the fashion. Seemed like a sweet kid. Thirteen is a tough age. In the school district we lived in (in Southern California) the parents would picket and call the newspaper and say their kid's right to freedom of expression was being obstructed for such a thing.

And today I broke one of my flip-flops. I hate having to find new flip-flops. My foot slipped on the parking brake and I hurt my toe...and broke the thong so it can't be fixed.

Today's hair by a tree

See? I need a trim. Been planning for a couple months to do it. I had my husband take all these 'before' pictures.

Unfortunately, no after pictures to share. We got a flat tire on the way home and he had to fix it. The light was gone by the time he was done.

Today's hair with happy arms and feet

I realized here I'm wearing tennis shoes. I don't like tennis shoes, I like hiking boots. They're much tougher. Like me. :)

I only slip on tennis shoes to go outside fast to feed the quail. I don't always know if they're going to come. After this photo I said "We have to stop. I'm wearing tennis shoes. Why didn't you tell me I'm wearing tennis shoes for pictures?" He said he thought I knew, but if I knew would I still have them on? No.

Today's hair in the house

My ends are straighter than this now. They feel softer. I think maybe I will have Ivan cut it back to this length next year. It feels like a good length to stay at for awhile.

Needing new leggings

Where do I start today.

I need new running pants. I guess I should say leggings. The ones I wore today - I had panty lines, and lint, and they're kind of high waters. They look really stupid on me. Note, I did not say I look stupid in them, but they look stupid on me. It's not my fault. Husband said I can order a new pair and he said I should get a whole outfit that's warm. My eyes are going bad and my last "outfit" is two different shades of black with two different styles of racing stripes that don't match. Well, they matched in the dressing room at the mall, they matched at the cash register, they just don't match in sunlight where you run in real life.

And what is up with legislating things that should be parental responsibility?

Inappropriate advertising contributes to many kids' ills, from obesity to anorexia, to drinking booze and having sex too soon, and Congress should crack down on it, the American Academy of Pediatrics says.

For us women here's an article from the Daily Mail in the UK. I see me to a tee in this one. Except for one thing. If my husband wandered...

Sorry, but women are dependent on men

I majored in anthropology so I found it very interesting. Feminists are going to have a complete melt down.

Lastly, I cannot locate my Advent prayers and Christmas carols. After five years, I finally have them whittled down to be a perfect fit for my family and now I can't find the folder with the contents. We've gottalottamanillafolders, but I can't find the one I need. I put it in a place that I wouldn't forget.

Serenity NOW.

New Mexico

I heard a good one today...

Most places have houses with pretty green grass in the front yard. But if a New Mexican has ten tons of rock in his yard he thinks he has a really nice yard. Haha!

Oh and if all the rocks in New Mexico were diamonds we'd all be rich! If only! New Mexico is a poor state. I saw poor in California, but it's more and worse in New Mexico. The housing stock is far more dilapidated. It's sad to see. I have a new friend and she's established a 501-c-3 (not for profit) organization and she distributes all sorts of items to those in need.

And people rake the rocks in their front yards here. For reals. We rake the campsites where we host and it looks so nice when we finish and makes the place look cared for. It gives a good impression.

Accidentally got a hair in my son's dinner tonight. He said "Yuk, what's this from?" and I said I was sorry and my husband said it's Mamma's hair. Sheesh. I had just redone it and I guess a loose one got away from me.

Speaking of long hairs, one time my husband ate a sandwich I made him and there was a long hair in it. Mine, ya know. He pulled the sandwich about a foot away from his mouth and there's this big, ol' long hair pulled like a tight wire, one end in the sandwich and the other end in his mouth. I was aghast. He was pretty calm. That was in 1990 so I've done pretty good keeping hair out of the foodstuffs till tonight.

Hope I didn't gross anyone out. Bwa-hahahaha!

Have a splendid Monday, this first day after the first day of Advent!

A new day

After much ado, I got up this morning and blurted out that I'd deleted the movies. My husband laughed. It was a great big belly laugh! Knock me over with a feather, will ya. I guess I look funny when I'm wringing my hands and explaining deleted files on the computer. Very matter-of-factly he said there was nothing to be done about it and if it's gone, it's gone. Which is true. He's very realistic. I lucked out! I do know he really enjoyed that Indian music and dancing and I rarely have him tell me to be sure to save a file. Usually he doesn't care much about dance/music productions presented for tourists.

Hey, hey, today is a new day!

And I like my husband's eyes when he looks at me.

And six months later I accidentally found those movies on my computer. Haha!

Maintenance

Ugh. I had to burn over four gigs of photos to CD tonight. Fun. Not.

But a bad thing happened. Of all the files I could have lost could I have lost the one my husband said to be sure to keep? That's exactly the one I've lost. I have a tummy ache.

The CDs only hold 700 megs each. I burned seven. I had one folder with three movies of the First Nations People in Manitoba dancing. Great costumes and the drums moved the earth. I've lost them. They're gone. I fancied uploading one of them to You Tube too. No chance of that now. I let them sit in the recycle bin (you see where this is going?) and figured when I was finished with burning everything in My Pictures I'd just restore the one folder with the movies. So I finished and I clicked Restore. Looked fine, my file folder for 7/18/06 disappeared, good...but it didn't show up in My Pictures...bad. So I restored all the folders and everything from January to July was gone and only August to December 2, 2006 got restored. Checked the settings for the recycle bin and it says my C drive is 32 gigs. Also says it's set to 10%. I don't know numbers very well but I know 4 gigs is more than 10% of 32. I think my recycle bin trashed it. I really don't feel too good. I didn't know the recycle bin had a limit!

Good thing my husband never reads my blog. Woe is me.

An unremarkable day

I did it. I kept Amazon.com in business for the day. Heh. Told my husband the price before I pressed Place Order and he just harrumpfed. He does that. He told me "Do it!" but I still checked with him half a dozen times. Then he walked by and asked me how long I was going to sit and look at the same thing on the computer. It's true. That's all I was doing! I can't help it. Finally, I was a man about it and I placed my order. I'm not worthy.

Other than that, I did pretty much nothing. We did sentence analysis today and son did better than the first session. He finished the unit on pronouns and next week he starts adjectives. I'd never have thought a fourth grader could absorb grammar so well. I didn't do science with him though. I should have. He loves it. But it was 3:00pm before I blinked an eye and that's quitting time for him.

I can't wait to see what the new camera can do! I ordered standard shipping and nothing will be shipped till next week what with this being Friday night.

We had 60+ quail come to our 'yard' and eat seed and drink water this morning. It's such a pretty warbling that they make. They're having a good year. They're all fat. They didn't come for a couple weeks and we thought we were blacklisted or something! Turned out there was a coyote or two prowling about so they were hiding a lot.

Advent begins Sunday. I'm not ready yet.

I'm going to knit for my sister now. I'm making her a scarf like mine only better and cuter and with fringe. Sister scarves.

Bad news of the worst kind

My size 7 blue jeans are officially tight. I'm having to wear my 9's. Why. Why, why, why does this have to happen? Dinner is so good and potlucks are so good and donuts before bed are so good. I admit my jeans were tightening up in the thigh a bit last month but it looked like the washer was shrinking them. Then I noticed the behind was stretched a bit taut but I figured things were still cool. Yellow flags only mean caution and I was cautious. Then I was getting ready to go to the potluck Wednesday and I had to change outfits three times because my buttons wouldn't button very well. Red flag! RED flag! RED FLAG! Clothes strewn all about the bedroom. My husband asked what was going on in there as I rushed to be ready at 6:00pm. I hate having to report this. Now I have to eat less. It's a cruel world.

Got cold in here and we had to buy a new heater. Our little heaters work fine down to 32° but it went down to about 17° Wednesday night and 22° last night and we got cold. I had to go to bed early the first night to warm up under the electric blanket. Plenty of sun outside though! This weather is common for January in New Mexico but not so much November. Which reminds me.

Happy December!

We got our flu shots, all three of us for free, yesterday.

Hooray for flu shots! It didn't hurt at all.

I found a home church for the winter. It's a charismatic one which is a first for me. I was very hesitant but when I went to a ladies prayer group there it was clear it was the place for me. How I love that feeling. One thing about traveling is, you can't get too hung up on denominations. Gotta pick from what's available. I still listen to Calvary Chapel online. Each denomination has its distinctives. The various churches created by man as they all are, have doctrine they adhere to and each tend to emphasize or de-emphasize different principles drawn from the Bible.

I admit I do not know when to capitalize the word "Bible" and this bothers me.

There are no ladies prayer meetings for the entire month of December. This is one of the things I don't like about holiday seasons.

I've decided, with thanks also to Michele and her son for the excellent summation of the 30D:

Canon EOS 30D digital SLR (Single Lens Reflex)
EF 28-135mm F/3.5-5.6. IS ISM lens
2 gig Ultra II CF card by Sandisk
Extra CR-2016 Lithium coin battery (not sure where to buy it yet)
Tamrac Adventure 7
Lens cleaning kit
Circular polarizer B+M 72mm

I missed the sale at Sandisk. Could have bought the CF card for $39.00, but noooo. I was too slow and last night they were sold out. I should have known better than to wait! Now I get to pay $76.98 at Amazon instead.

Most of the stuff is in my cart. I just can't pull the trigger. Usually my husband makes the big purchases and he's laughing that I'm having trouble. I think he enjoys watching me short circuit.