Born in the middle of Hurricane
Ivan's two visits to Louisianna.
Amanda and Travis actually ended up fleeing to Texas with Dad, Janice
and the dog prior to Ivan's first performance on US soil. Upon returning,
the Judds found things were a little messy at the old homestead
but okay, all things considered.
Little Alaina was born within days of the refugees returning home,
and I believe Amanda and the wee one had just been released from
the hospital when Ivan stole into Texas for his encore. Speaking
of Hurricanes, Tropical Storm Jeanne has graduated to a level three
hurricane, and is celebrating in the exhausted state of Florida
(sorry Aunt Lill, cousin Mike). The good news (for Aunt Lill at
least) is that Jeanne is moving fast, and speeding her way up the
coast to visit Aunt Jane and the rest of the clan! Psst.
Any photos emailed
to me will be posted in the next entry. I'm sorry, but we
can't pay you.
Last weekend we finally saw the first rainfall since our arrival
in Sacramento. That's the first rainfall in THREE MONTHS! Thank
you powers-that-be! I have arrived in the promise land! You would
think I would have recognized it when I saw the fields of gold everywhere.
My water-soaked brain told me I was seeing acres and acres of water-starved,
fire-starter grass, but no, the shimmering bullion pastures were
a sign that there shall be no more rain. Ever! Except for every
third month. Happy sigh.
Due to the sun-hardened earth and oil slicked roads, what was an
afternoon squall for most of us was heralded as a storm by the Sacramento
Bee. People got wet. To be fair, businesses and streets downtown
were flooded, and buckets were utilized. I was hoping for some lightening,
and stood at the ready on the porch, taking photos to share.
I could hear thunder popping off, but couldn't spot any electricity,
so you'll have to settle for these.
Black clouds rolled in with a vengeance.
I owe Joe HUGE for this shot.
Fog rose off the heated asphalt. It was cool.
We got some good news at the doctor's office last week. I'm going
to stick it on Linda's page, so you'll have to go
there for more info.
I've told you about the birds that hang out at the Crazy Cafe,
right? They are so funny looking! I've been trying to get a photo
of them for the longest time, but they're shy and the shots always
turn out fuzzy. Well, I finally snuck up on one and got a great
shot. Can anyone identify this little guy?
Finally, Mr. Funnyface, in the flesh (feathers).
No entry would be complete without a section on Tric, so here is
your September 26 Tric Strip.
No I don't know why she put a shirt
on me, but I'm pissed.
If she doesn't find work soon, she's going to
take us all to Crazyville with her.
Tell her I'm
considering a hunger strike.
This is for Lori.
09/13/04
Heading the news tonight is a phone call I received from Janice,
my father's wife. She called about an hour ago and said, "I just
wanted to let you know what's going on here." My first thought
was "Oh, no," because that's not how one typically preempts good
news, and her daughter Amanda is VERY pregnant.
"Okay."
"We're evacuating New Orleans."
"Uh..."
My mind raced to figure out what the heck they're doing in New Orleans
and why the heck they're evacuating. Here was the intricate
dance my neurons did while simultaneously trying to think of something
meaningful to say:
Janice and Dad went to see Amanda and Travis because Amanda
is due next week
Travis, like Joe, is in the Coast Guard
Amanda and Travis just got transfered
The Coast Guard transfered them to New Orleans
There's some mean Russian hurricane bearing down on the gulf
states
The city of New Orleans, while not directly on the coast, is
very near, and was built below sea level
Therefore, Janice, Dad, Travis, and the very pregnant Amanda
are fleeing New Orleans
My brain did the math a little faster than that,
but I'm ashamed to admit it had to do the math.
"Oh. OH! Okay!"
"Your father and Travis are out right now buying up sandbags."
"Cool. Listen, you have a good camera, right? Take lots of pictures
and send them to me so I can post them on the website. Please? It
will be fun."
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how low I have sunk. Exploiting
my family's misfortune in the name of entertainment. Nonetheless,
I'm soooo excited to see the pictures! So excited that I might
call Janice back just to let her know I wasn't kidding, "Really.
I know you have stuff going on, but please take some pictures
and FedEx them. Thank you." Amanda's baby is due
next Thursday, so I'll keep you updated. Hopefully they'll send
pictures of that too.
PS. Does anyone know why the residents of Louisiana built New Orleans
below sea level? When I try to picture it, I imagine a city with
really cool music that fills up like a cup when it rains; water
slowly rising up the sides of buildings, story by story, until
New Orleans resembles one of those snow globes. A musical
snow globe. Blub blub blub.
PSS. The weather channel just announced the naming of the newest
tropical storm of the 2004 season. Watch out for Hurricane Jean.
Woohoo!
I received my last birthday present in the mail today. I have been
waiting with bated breath. What is bated breath? It sounds like
it would be foul. Anyway, it is the newest Patricia
Cornwell novel, Trace. I am a huge fan of Patricia Cornwell's
Kay Scarpetta series. So, uh, you probably won't hear from me for
the rest of the week while I devour this novel. Then I'll be bummed
out because I read it so quickly and face a dismal future of waiting;
waiting prehaps for years for the next book in the series to be
released.
Sorry, I'm reading! Call next week!
Also in the mail today was a note from Aunt Rena regarding her newest
business venture, Na's
Fine Gifts. She's selling really cool gift items; the kind I
love to send people at Christmas (candelabras, stained glass, and
gift baskets).
After last week's entry I'm pleased to share the following photo
with you. Its a photo of Mom cooking dinner last night. She whipped
up Roasted Potato and Fennel soup. It was delicious, and tasted
like its name.
"Soups on!"
Having grown up in Juneau, I associate fall with cold wet rain.
I've always wanted to see fall leaves, the kind that layer the ground
and get raked into piles that children (or grownups) can jump in
and throw at each other and hide beneath. Check it out!
The start of a fall leaf pile! I don't think I'll be hiding
in it (in case any of Claussen's relatives
remain in residence in our backyard). But its still cool,
no?!
All the pretty colors...
09/10/04
Welcome to September!! I didn't realize how long it had been since
the last update until I received a gentle reminder in the last
entry's comments. We're still here. The last two weeks have
been... tiring. Not to make excuses (but I will) I just haven't
felt... funny. And who wants to bum out the readers? But, if you
insist, I will do what I can to entertain you.
badump bump chhhh
So I'll dispense of the nasty stuff first, and
then we can get to the good stuff (click here
to skip the depressing stuff and head straight to the stupid stuff).
Two weeks ago we ended up taking mom to the emergency room. It wasn't
a panic, "CALL 911" kind of thing. It was Saturday, and that's
what the handy oncologist/hemocologist on-call guy at the cancer
clinic recommended.
"I can't diagnose you over the phone. Go to a clinic
or ER or something, but make sure they'll take your insurance first."
Ahhh, the bedside manner. Can't you FEEL it?! After
twenty two hours, multiple blood tests, xrays, an ultrasound, and
a cardio CT something-or-other, they let her go home, with new prescriptions
and the promise of much more crap to come. We've been at the hospital
or clinic 12 of the last 15 days (including Labor Day) for some
test or to get some kind of medicine.
The good news is that they seem to have the problem under control
--sarcasm-- "When does your prescription expire? What
do you mean you ran out two days ago? You only got 14 doses?
That's not supposed to happen. " On the sunny side
of things, after coming back from a training session on how to give
herself injections (picture that anyone who knows her), mom found
another package had been delivered from Juneau. It contained
MORE TONS O' CHOCOLATE! Rollin' rollin' rollin'.
By the way, if you've never spent a Saturday night in a big city
ER, I don't recommend it, unless you're doing a study for your sociology
class. Among the more interesting visitors was a tatooed, blonde,
leather sporting drunk guy; there was blood-curdling screaming;
some guy was tied to his bed, and there were gurneys sporting people
lined up in the hall outside... Generally creepy stuff.
With that said, let's see what fun news I
can dredge up. Ah yes, Claussen (pronounced with a German accent,
very strong emphasis on the OW: cl-OW-sen). Our very temporary
guest. Last week I came across an unusual looking spider.
I was picking dead petals from some flowers, drew my hand back for
a moment, and was startled to see this, where my hand had been.
I screamed like a girl and jumped like ten feet. It
was funny.
Claussen, glaring at me.
Her pure white body was so strange that I had to capture her so
I could figure out what the heck kind of spiders we might have running
around. I never did figure it out. Anyone? But I did figure out
she was a she when the next day I found a little nest in the jar,
and a much more svelte spider than the one you see above. And lots
of little eggs. Hmm. So how did she get her name? The pickle jar
that she called home for two days, in the shade of the tree in the
corner of the yard as far away from the house as I could get her
(per mom's pleadings). Claussen and her brood were asked to
leave.
Last Saturday Joe and I took advantage of a rare day with nothing
to do, and finally headed up to Lake Tahoe. I've been harrassing
him to take me there for three months now. When I woke up Saturday
morning I found him stowing stuff in the car, like a backpack with
toothbrushes and clothes, and Tric's bowl. Yeah!!! Roadtrip. We
didn't end up staying there overnight, but we did make it all the
way around the lake. My main observations were 1) This must be the
bike capital of the world 2) I bet you need a lot of money to live
here and 3) Why would you want to live anywhere else. We think Tric
enjoyed the trip as well, although she seemed to tire of the car
after six hours or so.
Look at the trees, and cars! Open my window!
Can we pull over? I have to pee.
Are we there yet?
We had Mickey D's for breakfast and dinner. Tric got a sausage patty,
a hamburger patty and de-battered chicken mcnuggets (I know, we're
horrible). She would not, however, touch the fries, regardless of
my relentless attempts to shove them in her mouth.
No thank you.
Really, I'm full.
What is wrong with you?!
Tahoe was truly beautiful, and I'm hoping we'll
get up there more often. It was everything I had imagined it would
be. Except for the tourists. I didn't know about them. It
reminded me of home, except it was warm. Beautiful, green
and warm. I've found heaven. I took a few pictures for
posterity. Okay, I took them for you. For the site. Whatever.
Welcome to Tahoe!
The main street shops were so quaint!
The water was so translucent!
Tric wanted to chase lizards, but we made her
sit still for photos instead.
Sunday, I made Minnestrone soup. Mmmmmm. It turned out really well.
As Joe said,"It doesn't taste like minnestrone, but its damn
fine soup sweetie." Are you seeing a pattern
here? I totally do what the recipes say??!! Oh, and when it says
"takes two and a half hours" what they mean is "takes
five hours if you count the stuff you have to do other than cooking
time".
It was pretty yummy.
Are you still there? If you've made it this far, you get to read
about perhaps the most exciting thing to happen in our lives so
far this September (and the reason this will be the last paragraph
- Joe wants to finish our project). We're building Joe's mom a new
computer! More correctly, Joe is showing me how to build his mom's
new computer. He's done this half a dozen times, and I wanted to
learn. Needless to say, it is taking a little longer than we thought
it would. We had a little issue with what we thought was the motherboard.
After an evening wasted trying to make it work, we bought a new
motherboard. It wasn't the motherboard. I had designated the hard-drive
'master' instead of 'stand alone'. Solving the problem was pretty
much as simple as flipping a switch. So we have an extra motherboard.
We're talking about pillaging my old HP and turning it into a web
server (hear that Karenza)?
Linda C's computer.
Anyone want a motherboard?
Oh, I know I said that was the last bit of news, but I have one
more thing for the Juneau-ites. Karenza is finally going retail
with her new frame shop! Frame of Mind, custom art framing.
If you want your art infused with a breath of fresh air, she will
be opening soon in the Foodland Supermarket shopping area, where
Allstate used to be. If you can't wait for the doors to open, call
her at 586.6322. She currently works out of her house.
Her website will soon be available and I will post it here, because
of course, she's asked me to build it. Yeah!
