Funny, funny stuff

We discovered this guy today on comedy central. I haven't laughed this hard watching stand up in quite a while. He reminds me of a combination of Steven Wright and Gill.

Who Needs Kids?

Who needs kids when you can have your entire neighborhood come to you! I just got this picture from my neighbor -- this was taken on Halloween as the entire street of kids gathered in front of our house for a photo op.

Great Stocking Stuffer

I got these for Dawn and Mike for Christmas this year and they were quite the hit. So if you need a stocking stuffer idea that is environmentally friendly, you should pick up some Envirosax! These sturdy reusable shopping bags are strong enough to hold 3 bags of groceries, yet fit easily in a pocket, glove compartment or purse. And they look kinda cool too.

Happy Birfday to Me!

I've had a good birthday so far, considering I am still pretty sick. Apparently, I have this evil cold that does not want to go away. Not sure if it's the same one that's killing people, but I sure felt like I wanted to die several times this week!

John got me Guitar Hero III for the Wii for my birthday, so we've been playing that. He's already beaten it on the easy level (had to battle the Devil while playing The Devil Went Down to Georgia to do it). I had a 90 minute massage at the spa in South Riding followed by a sauna and then got a Carmel Latte at Panera before coming back home. When I arrived home, I was greeted by some cards and calls from family and friends.

Coincidentally, I happened to get another really cool suprise today that just so happened to arrive on my birthday. I got an invitation from Bob LaRose's new company -- to attend the Christmas Party this year. Apparently people from both Bob's old companies and his new company, Agilex, are invited this year so John and I get to have one last Integic blast from the past next month. Pretty cool.

Neti Pot to the Rescue!

John brought me home a nasty cold on his way back from Dallas this weekend. I have been cooped up in the house catching up on episodes of Heroes and Dexter. In order to speed up my healing process, I have jerry-rigged a green tea pot as my new Neti pot. (Don't worry, if you come to my house later on, I will NOT serve you green tea from this pot -- or I'll at least wash it first). What's a Neti Pot? Here's a wonderful you tube demonstration:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQm7YpxgOnA

For the Cat Lovers...

Carnage in South Riding!

I was letting Bailey out to pee a few weeks ago and saw this on my deck railing. It was too amazing not to photograph.

From Baton Rouge to DC

On Wednesday, my best friend from college came to visit me for the first time since our wedding. We managed to have a great time sightseeing some more unique things in the area. A few pictures from her trip are below:



This statue was the suggestion of Gill. It is called "The Awakening" and is on Hains Point in DC. It is actually 5 statues -- looking at them from afar makes it look as though a 75 foot man is coming out of the earth. After Hains Point, we went to the Spy Museum (no photos allowed).

Next stop was the zoo, where we met one of the Panda babies (above) and then went to the Golden Lion Tamarin exhibit to watch Gill in volunteering action. We sat there for 3 hours and watched as the volunteers took "snapshots" of the GLT activities every 15 minutes. Below are 2 of the 6 tamarins that they were tracking.
On Saturday, we decided to go to Mary Baldwin -- the college where we met. It was a very emotional experience for me, as I had not been there since the day I moved out to transfer to Mary Washington. It is amazing how one place can bring back both happy and sad memories. Driving around Staunton after leaving Baldwin, I saw this painted on the side of an old hardware and feed store and thought it needed capturing.

Global Warming with Breakfast!

http://www.wishingfish.com/210597.html

Postsecret Mystery Solved

More info here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postsecret

Help for Mac Users

One of the things I've come to hate about my mac, is that there is no easy way to quit all open applications at once. After some research, I found this handy little script that I copied into AppleScript, saved as an application and loaded it on my dock. Now, all I have to do is double-click and all my apps shut down at once. Enjoy!

tell application "System Events" to set the_apps to name of every application process whose visible is true and name is not "Finder"
repeat with each_app in the_apps
tell application each_app to quit
end repeat

OH NO!!!!!!!

Postsecret is gone!!! My normal Sunday morning reading material is no more. Does anyone know what happened to it, if Frank is moving it somewhere else, or if someone else will be picking up the cause?

Newest Cake

The below cake was made for Gabe (turning 30) and Aubrey (turning 1) for a luau party. Everything on it is edible, including the white chocolate shells. I also made 15 cupcakes for the little ones complete with cocktail umbrella. Enjoy!

Memories.

My cousin Emily brought this picture over to my house a while ago. Apparently, when I was in elementary school, my Mom brought her to visit me and eat lunch with me. I think it's hilarious how thrilled we both looked to be sharing that special moment with each other.

Time Waster

If you are a fan of point and click puzzle games, this is a great site. Beware - only click if you have an hour or two to kill, these are addicting.

Ten Rules to Live By to Achieve ENTJ Success

1. Feed Your Strengths! Give yourself every opportunity to show others your appreciation of a situation and how you could see it through to a good outcome. Take charge where you can make it count.

2. Face Your Weaknesses! Understand you have limits too. Your careful world view is not the whole deal. How things look and feel may not concern you, but they concern many others. Try and allow such things to be and learn from them.

3. Talk Time to Find Out How Others Really Think. You need to drive past your thoughts with others and let their appreciations of a situation reach you at a deeper level. It will then be possible for you to take account of their needs as real world objectives which if included in your ideas will bring greater harmony and quality to life and relationships.

4. Take Time Out To Let The Whole Situation Speak To You. Don't dismiss those abstract and seemingly hard to understand or bothersome aesthetic and feeling judgments coming from others or from inside yourself. Drop everything for a while, stop thinking and worrying and just relax into those ideas and let them speak to you. Perhaps they can be accommodated, perhaps something is hiding in there which offers a new way

5. When You Get Upset, You Lose. Your energy and rational understandings are strong assets, but can be very harmful if they turn against you and leave you with nothing but emotions you cannot deal with. Remember that others cannot always be expected to fall into your ways of seeing, and when your drive to make them do so fails you will suffer feelings of resentment and even abandonment. You cannot deal with the world like this. Moderate your ideas, allow others their spaces, and you will grow.

6. Respect your Need for Intellectual Compatibility Don't expect yourself to be a "touchy-feely" or "warm-fuzzy" person. Realize that your most ardent bonds with others will start with the head, rather than the heart. Be aware of other's emotional needs, and express your genuine love and respect for them in terms that are real to YOU. Be yourself.

7. Be Accountable for Yourself. Don't blame the problems in your life on other people. Look inwardly for solutions. No one has more control over your life than you have.

8. Be Humble. Judge yourself at least as harshly as you judge others.

9. Take a Positive Approach to Differences in People. Don't distress yourself and others by dwelling on what seem to be their limitations. They need you to guide them and you need them to see things through. Try and recognize who can perform the most ably within certain fields outside your own competence. Let the feelings of others become a strength rather than a hindrance to you.

10. Don't Get Obsessed! Recognize the value that personal world has to you, your friends, your family, your own inner sense of self worth and life. Take pride in just being a good person and don’t allow external situations to control you. Try to relax and let the moment belong to the best things you can find in others and yourself. Nothing out there is more important than your own happiness.

Un-Meet Arleigh

Fortunately, with dogs (unlike children), you can always give them back if it doesn't work out the way you expected. John and I spoke about it for about 2 hours tonight and came to the realization that two dogs just wasn't in the cards for us right now in our lives. Arleigh is a handful and is not nearly as intelligent as Bailey. It's very hard to train a dog that has no concept of listening skills or consequences. In fact, every time we'd tell him "no", Bailey would run over and bark to enforce what we were telling him... it was almost as if Bailey knew we weren't getting through to him!

At any rate, the shelter has been very supportive and we'll be bringing him back tomorrow.

It just wasn't meant to be, I guess.

Meet Arleigh

Well, as all of our friends are now entering the phase in their lives where they are having 2 children, John and I decided to get on the bandwagon and adopt our second "child" as well. Meet Arleigh. He arrived home today, 8 months, 39 pounds, 0 ounces.

3rd Grade Racism

I'm sure a lot of you have heard of this widely known 3rd grade experiment conducted by a teacher in the 1970s to help her class learn what it feels like to be discriminated against. I was very pleased to recently find out that Frontline is posting more and more of its episodes online, to include this famous airing.

If you have an extra 45 minutes, I highly recommend watching it.

The Dog and The Bounty Hunter

So I was walking Bailey this morning when a guy in a GTO drove up to me and asked me for directions. (Poor guy -- he had no clue that I am direction challenged). He was trying to get to one of the millions of South Riding streets and I had no idea how to help him. I finally asked him if he had a cell phone so he could call the person he was trying to meet. He then explained that he was a bounty hunter and was looking for a fugitive and giving the guy advanced warning wasn't the best of ideas.

I'm not sure why, but that made my day (although it should have skeeved me out that there was a fugitive in my neighborhood).

First Veggie of the Summer

I planted yellow squash, zucchini, cucumbers and pumpkins this year in my backyard. This was the first zucchini I picked the other day -- not a bad size!

Congrats Em and Jim!

Cogitate

While getting ready for work this morning, I was watching Fox News and they were showing the unveiling of the new White House Press Room. President Bush was there for the ribbon cutting and was joking around with the press about various things. During the briefing, he used the word, "cogitate". I had never heard this word before so I decided to look it up on dictionary.com to see if it was a real word or a "Bushism". Lo and behold, it's a real word! I didn't realize Bush used those!

I wonder if the press will say anything about it...

From the Mouths of Babes...

My Mom just sent me this email regarding my 8 year old nephew:

Riding to Mass yesterday Jacob wanted to know if when we go back home if he could invite Aunt Michelle over to the house. I told him you are a working woman and have only two days off and it was so generous of you to take them to her house for games, McDonalds and a visit with friends. I told him you have chores to do, clean your house, weed, take care of Bailey, and help Uncle John.

He said NO, he had spent the night at your house and you don't have a lot to do . "After you eat breakfast you load the dish washer then you play video games!"

He said he saw you with his own eyes!

Love mom

The July 4th Cheese Fry Challenge -- Documented

John and I spent our July 4th at Outback watching our friends single handedly* eat a plate of layered cheese fries. Then we went to the parking lot and watched the Vienna fireworks.

Here are timelines of the two finishers:

MIKEY

JOE

*With the exception that Joe did share one or two fries with Laura and Maggie

Back From Reno

I just got in from Reno last night and am pretty darn tired. I will post more later, but in the meantime, here are a few shots I grabbed visiting Lake Tahoe with Jen.

I thought this little boy was too cute trying to drag this heavy cooler (probably full of his Dad's beer).

This is Jen doing her best to not kill me for making her pose on a really large tree stump.

Jen snapped this of me at the state park where we were taking in the scenery.


This is the view going down the 10,000 foot mountain on our way back from Tahoe to Reno.



This Virginian couldn't resist taking this picture of the Virginian in downtown Reno. Reno itself was not that exciting -- it resembled the old parts of Vegas... full of check cashing places, wedding chapels, XXX movie houses and pawn shops. Jennifer and I felt a little unsafe as everywhere we went the store clerks told us to watch our purses and to be careful. Needless to say, we mainly stayed inside the Nugget surrounded by several security friends from the conference.

This sign is unfortunately the best part of Reno.

Oscar would be VERY grouchy

Take a gander at this computer map of all of the space trash around our earth. Apparently, NASA tracks all space trash greater than 10 centimeters so they know when and where to launch satellites, space shuttles, rockets, and more importantly, people.

Now you can die how you lived...

With Costco!

Slum Crew 20th

Had another great Slum Crew this year -- I think this picture of Joe from Saturday morning sums up how tired I am right now, though...

I also managed to grab a shot of the Slum Crew Museum...

Hot dogs, Soprano Style

YUM!

50 States

How well do you know your state geography?

I got a 92.5 score, with an average error of 12 miles in 179 seconds.

Bodies is Here!

Who wants to go?!

You Win Some, You Lose Some

Some people knew that I was running for the National Board of Directors spot with my non-profit security organization that I belong to. 6 people were running for 5 spots, so my odds were pretty good. Unfortunately, I lost the election. Bummer. Although I am fairly well recognized in my field in the DC area where I am the chapter Secretary, I am not so much recognized on a National level. Apparently, this is what hurt me in the election. It took me a few days to recover from the loss, as I am now not sure what I am going to do with my professional life for the next 2 years (it would have been a two year term). Some have suggested that I run for the Chapter Chair position of my chapter this year, others have suggested that I run for BOD next year. Whatever it is, I need to do some thinking. Staying active in the organization is a great way to network and give back to the security community. We are a very small group (probably less than 10,000 of us nationwide), so positive networking is a really good way to move up in the profession.

On the other hand, this may be an opportunity for me to focus more on the rest of my life -- perhaps do some charity work or get back into my hobbies. All I know is whatever I am meant to do these next two years, does not include being on the Board.

Back From Seattle

We had a blast! Here's a few interesting photos from the trip.

Success!

AURGH!

If anyone can figure out how to get the 3rd tile, let me know!

http://www.kotarogame.com/archives/53702998.html

The Delicate Art of Life

I received a post on this blog early this morning that made me take pause. It was from a woman that used to date my late uncle. Apparently, she was searching for him and came across my grandfather's obituary that I had posted last year. She said she had been looking for him for a while, and this was the closest she had come to finding him. I responded to her explaining that my uncle passed away in a car accident 17 years ago, and also explained that he was able to save several lives by being an organ donor. I was glad that I was able to help her get some closure.

Writing her tonight made me think about how short life is and how delicate relationships can be. I have often wondered if I have told everything I need to everyone that I care about... that if I were to die today, if I have said it all. But what never occurred to me, is has everyone else told me everything they need to? Or are there even people out there at all that would care enough about me to search me out 17 years after my death?

I hope that my life will make a difference. It's my job to find out how.

The Art of Friendship

Best friends require one-on-one contact to survive. Telephone calls and getting together are musts for best friends to continue.

In fact, probably the quickest way to end a friendship is to neglect it and sever contact.

Yet it is hard to make time in a busy day and busy life to maintain our friends. But you don't have to have hours to spare to maintain a friendship.

Instead try the following to keep from neglecting your friends:

• Send frequent email. Email is a boon for a quick note.
• Call once a week. Telephone calls do not take long.
• Keep in touch through brief messages left on answering machines.
• Send an occasional card. Funny and/or appropriate cards take minutes to choose and address.
• Exercise together. We all have to exercise. It is more fun with a friend, plus, there is no better place for talking than a walk in the park.
• Clean house together. This is another must do and two makes cleaning fun instead of boring.
• Send pictures. A picture is still worth a thousand words.
• Go to lunch at least once a month. More often would be better.

Follow the advice of Victoria Rayner, author of The Survival Guide for Today's Career Woman:

• Be a good listener; refrain from offering advice or moralizing.
• Respect your friend's point of view. Different personalities can complement each other; it isn't always necessary to see eye to eye.
• Never betray a trust. Trust, when violated, can ruin even the best friendship.
• Support and praise your friends; ignore their failures and imperfections.
• Never resent a friend's success. Instead, strive to admire her achievements.

Flexibility is always important for maintaining friendships. Be understanding when your friend has a last minute change in plans. Learn to accept "I'm sorry to cancel, but we will have another time together Sunday."

When paths begin to separate (you are married; he isn't or you have a baby; she is still childless) at forks in the road of life, that is the most important time of all to stay in touch with friends.

When there is conflict, it must be resolved for friendship to continue. Confrontation is one way to resolve conflict. Talking it out is another.

A cooling-off period is sometimes necessary when conflict has occurred. Once you reinitiate conflict, it may not even be necessary to discuss the conflict.

By Joy Stevens

Poems

I wrote this February 9, 1998. I believe this was for a creative writing exercise in college. At the time, I was happily in a relationship so I don't think I had a muse for this, but was trying to do some play on words and see if I could pull it off. Although a bit cheesy, I kind of like the 4th stanza:

The Four Elements of Love

How I dream to be the mighty wind,
To carry the wings of your love,
To whisk you away to far off places,
And anywhere else I dare dream of.

And Oh, to be the placid water,
That from your cup you sip,
To be brought to your glorious mouth,
Feeling the sticky sweet touch of your lips.

Oh, to be the trembling earth,
That lay beneath your feet,
To be the stable ground you rely on,
To have your trust be mine to keep.

But oh! I beg the Lord above,
To let me be a ravishing fire,
For there is nothing that I’d rather be,
Than your very own burning desire.

This one was written in 1997 for an English project:

A is for Apple

Apples fall
briskly from the
careless tree
drizzling an
enormous amount of
fruit in one
gigantic
heap of
indecision.
Just then, a zestful
kite flies
lightly across the sky into the
mass of branches
now no longer bearing apples. The
odious tree, that
plummeted red gems,
quietly imprisons the kite in
revenge and
secures it in a
teasing,
ultra apathetic and
violent
way. Then-- the anti-
xenial plant releases the
young aerodynamic
zestless aircraft to join the heap of victims below.

I wrote the below poem in 10th grade when my best friend and boyfriend started dating. That was a traumatic year for a 15 year old. Although the poetry is dreadful, I really like the clever use of shapes to describe what happened that year:

Shapes

There were four of us,
Two happy couples,
We were thrilled to see,
Our love in doubles.

It was her and him,
And me and you,
Our square was wonderful,
As it was brand new.

Then her and him split,
Yet we still remained,
The three of us were friends,
In happiness uncontained.

Soon we had a triangle,
I had yet to perceive,
Because you and her,
Began to deceive--me.

The triangle formed a nasty circle,
With fighting, and yelling,
What would happen next,
There was no telling.

So now the circle,
Became a single line,
Connecting two points,
And neither point was mine.

You and her connected,
Ignoring the square,
You acted so happy,
Without so much as a care.

Then she cut the line,
You two had to part,
And all of us involved,
Were back at the start.

Now we're all points,
Just floating around,
None are connected,
No shape can be found.

All I ask,
As if you even care,
Is for me, you, her, and him,
To again just be square.

New Look

I thought I'd change things around a bit and gave my blog a new look, with the help of google's new interfaces. I also like the green theme -- a little more serene than my old blog.

Enjoy!

Don't Have Room For a Compost Heap?

Compost in your kitchen!

Whateva

I was walking Bailey tonight in my 'hood when I found a CD on the ground labeled "Whateva - February 23, 2007". I popped it into my computer and the following tracks were found:

• Wouldn't Get Far -- Kanye West
• That's That Dirty -- Snoop Dogg
• Go Getta -- Young Jeezy
• I Luv It Dirty -- Young Jeezy
• Soul Surv -- Young Jeezy & Akon
• Locked Up Remix Dirty -- Akon
• Don't Matter -- Akon
• This is Why I'm Hot -- MIMS
• Throw Some Ds -- Rich Boy
• Oh Yeah -- Lil' Scrappy
• Money In the Bank -- Lil' Scrappy
• Want You -- Young Lloyd & Lil Wayne
• What Goes Around Comes Around -- Justin Timberlake
• Runaway Love -- Ludacris
• Affirmative Action -- Nas
• You Never Know -- Immortal Technique
• Dance With the Devil -- Immortal Technique

I don't really have anything to say about it, but I may submit the CD to FOUND.

From Dictionary.com...

tic·ky-tack·y
–adjective

1.	shoddy and unimaginatively designed; flimsy and dull: a row of new, ticky-tacky bungalows.

Little Boxes

There's a fairly new show on Showtime called Weeds. The premise of the show is pretty interesting -- it's about a suburban housewife whose husband dies and she's left with no money. In order to keep the lifestyle that her and her children are accustomed to, she decides to become a drug dealer.

The theme song of the show is called "Little Boxes" which describes South Riding and all the other neighborhoods like it perfectly:

Little Boxes

by Malvina Reynolds

Little boxes on the hillside, Little boxes made of tickytacky
Little boxes on the hillside, little boxes all the same
There's a green one and a pink one and a blue one and a yellow one
And they're all made out of ticky tacky and they all look just the same.

And the people in the houses all went to the university
Where they were put in boxes and they came out all the same,
And there's doctors and there's lawyers, and business executives
And they're all made out of ticky tacky and they all look just the same.

And they all play on the golf course and drink their martinis dry,
And they all have pretty children and the children go to school
And the children go to summer camp and then to the university
Where they are put in boxes and they come out all the same.

And the boys go into business and marry and raise a family
In boxes made of ticky tacky and they all look just the same.

I often wonder how much longer I am going to be able to continue to live in my "box made of ticky tacky" and still be a unique, functioning member of society.

Religious Persecution A-OK, Gay Bashing? Not so Much...

From the front page of msn.com today:

When a few classmates razzed Rebekah Rice about her Mormon upbringing with questions such as, "Do you have 10 moms?" she shot back: "That's so gay."

After Rice got a warning and a notation in her file, her parents sued, claiming officials at Santa Rosa's Maria Carillo High violated their daughter's First Amendment rights when they disciplined her for uttering a phrase "which enjoys widespread currency in youth culture," according to court documents.

But school officials say they took a strict stand against the put down after two boys were paid to beat up a gay student the year before.

"The district has a statutory duty to protect gay students from harassment," the district's lawyers argued in a legal brief. "In furtherance of this goal, prohibition of the phrase 'That's so gay' ... was a reasonable regulation."

Rice's parents, Elden and Katherine Rice, also claim the public high school employed a double-standard because, they say, administrators never sought to shield Rebekah from teasing based on Mormon stereotypes.

Ok, granted... the suing of the school may have been a little much, and the expression "that's so gay" is not the most PC term in the world, but seriously -- giving a child a warning for saying "that's so gay" but turning a blind eye to the kids that were making fun of her religion?

Digging for Graves

A week ago, I started delving into my genealogy projects some more. My newest discovery was that I was able to determine that Lord Calvert of Baltimore was my 10th- great grandfather... pretty cool stuff. At any rate, while digging up my past, I came across a website called findagrave.com. Apparently, there are people that go around to cemeteries all over the world and document graves. Findagrave has even listed its top posters -- some people submitting over 50,000 graves to this site!

There's also a neat feature on the site where if you really want a picture of a grave, and you are not able to travel there, you can request that a grave hunter go and photograph it for you. Cool!

I was able to find my grandmother on this site who passed away in 2005 and some of my ancestors as well. You can also do searches for famous people and leave "virtual flowers" at the graves.

My Makeover

For my birthday, my mother-in-law purchased an "Excitation" for me -- basically it was a gift certificate for an experience of my choice. I chose to have a one-on-one makeup consultation with celebrity makeup artist Erwin Gomez in Georgetown.

The whole experience lasted about an hour and a half, and was a lot of fun. I learned a lot of great makeup tips like dont use your fingers to put on foundation, never put concealer on your pimples (go figure) and dont use brown mascara on a fair complexion. After my "free" experience, he promptly asked me if I wanted to take home some of the "product" he used on me. "Sure," I replied.

Before I knew it, he loaded everything he used on me into a bag and handed it to the cashier. "That will be $400 dollars please." GULP!!!!!!!!! So much for my celebrity experience.

Erwin was great -- apparently he does the Bush twins' eyebrows and after some googling, I found out they attended his wedding in 2004. Wonder what W thought about that one?

First Honeybees, now Frogs?

I think humans are next...

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,251365,00.html?sPage=fnc.science/naturalscience

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,252215,00.html

Even Drug Smugglers Have Rights in America!

Not sure if any of you have heard about this one. Apparently, a while back, there were two border patrol agents that caught a Mexican citizen trying to smuggle 725 pounds of marijuana into the country. The guy decided to run, so the agents shot at him, hitting him in the butt. Not only are the two border patrol agents in jail serving 11 and 12 year terms, but the drug smuggler has been granted amnesty and is suing the US Government for 5 million dollars.

There's a million articles swirling about on this one, but here's one of them:
http://www.startribune.com/484/story/995662.html

Blast from the Past

I was reading a bunch of my saved documents from college, and happened across this letter that I posted on our school cafeteria's comment board. The board was designed for note card sized comments, but I took it a bit further by posting this...

Dear Wood Company:

I have just read the article in the student newspaper about your services. Although I am not fully satisfied with everything you have to offer, I believe that the letter was not fair to your company because it did a lot of complaining and didn’t list any solutions. Therefore, I would like to tell you a little about what I have observed my 3 semesters here at Mary Washington.

First of all, I am very pleased with your comment board. You always respond promptly to students ideas and if an idea is not feasible, you list the reasons why. This tells us that you actually do care about our concerns. Also, I understand that it is very difficult to provide for a large amount of students. You either please most the students some of the time or some of the students most of the time. It is a no win situation, and I congratulate you on putting forth your best efforts. With that said, I would like to list a variety of concerns that I have and possible solutions to remedy these problems.

The first thing I would like to point out, is your cakes. These cakes taste so good when they’re fresh! However, when you cut them up in individual slices, they quickly get stale because all four sides are exposed to the air. Why don’t you place the entire cake out uncut and let students cut the cake themselves? That way, you don’t have to worry about cutting the cakes, and we don’t have to worry about them getting stale!

The second thing, is the sodas. This seems like a very simple solution to a very frequent problem. A day doesn’t go by when all the syrup is gone from the soda machines leaving us with a glass of club soda. This past week, all the sodas but Dr. Pepper were out of syrup in the North Room. This leaves students with little options when the milk is frequently sour and the juices are just as watery as the sodas. If you could check the syrup on the machines more often, I do believe this could be solved.

Another thing I’m sure you have noticed is the ice cream. Have you noticed that after a while, the only thing that is left in the freezers are popsicles? This is because none of the students will eat them because of the thick coating of slime covering each one. If you could either order less popsicles and more ice cream, or find a way to regulate the freezers so the slime doesn’t appear, you’d have a lot more students eating the frozen treats.

Also, college students are scared of “gourmet” foods. I wanted to give you an example of a name of one of these foods but when I asked my friends, they all said, “I don’t remember… I don’t eat those.” And it’s true! The food in the South Room is unappealing mainly because of its “exotic” names. Instead of oranges and zucchini, serve things like mashed potatoes and gravy! Give us old fashioned foods that our mothers make like fried chicken and stuffing and corn instead of eggplant and rutabaga. I’m sure you’ll get a much larger response if the foods we are given are familiar to us.

Another concern we tend to have is that of “recycled food.” This means that one day, you’ll serve sweet potatoes and the next day, you’ll serve sweet potato soup. I understand your need to conserve, but it automatically triggers a red flag in our minds and we tend to steer clear of foods served the day before. A large concern of students is food poisoning and “recycled food” poses a huge threat to our weak tummies.

I hope that these suggestions were of a help to you and I thank you for your time.

Sincerely,

Michelle Lambiasi

New Game

It's pretty easy, but fun for a few minutes.

Global Warming

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17042993/?GT1=9033

Dog DNA -- Email

Hello Michelle

Thank you for your interest in the MMI Genomics Canine Heritage™ test product. Canine Heritage™ test kits will be available at the end of February. We will send you information to request a sampling kit at that time. Please watch your mailbox for further Canine Heritage™ news over the next few weeks. The cost of the test will be $65 per dog.

Currently, these 38 breeds (listed below) are included in the Canine Heritage™ test.

If you have any more questions, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Yours sincerely,

Paul

Afghan Hound
Akita
Basenji
Basset Hound
Beagle
Belgian Tervuren
Bernese Mountain Dog
Border Collie
Borzoi
Boxer
Bulldogs
Chihuahua
Chinese Shar-Pei
Chow chow
Cocker Spaniel
Collie
Dachshund
Doberman Pinscher
English Setter
German Shepherd Dog
German Shorthaired Pointer
Golden Retriever
Greyhounds
Italian Greyhound
Labrador Retriever
Mastiff
Miniature Schnauzer
Poodle
Pug
Rottweiler
Saluki
Samoyed
Shetland Sheepdog
Shih Tzu
Siberian Husky
St Bernard
Whippet
Yorkshire Terrier

Dog DNA

Ok, so I've tested myself, my next step is to test Bailey. Once the kit becomes available at the end of the month, poor ol' Bailey is gettin the cheek swab!

http://www.metamorphixinc.com/products3.html

In the News

I subscribe to Popular Science and in reading some of the recent issues today, I found some cool things going on in our technology world...

• Open Source Textbooks: At www.curriki.org, you can register to start reading free, online textbooks. Although it is in its infancy now, this tool may be just the key to saving our schools hundreds of millions of dollars.
• Growing Bladders from DNA: A scientist was able to build a bio-degradable scaffold of a bladder, spray a patient's bladder cells onto the scaffold and presto! A new bladder.
  
• Cure for Asthma: By sticking a tube down a patient's throat and into their lungs, radio frequency signals blast the walls of the lungs to get rid of asthma attacks.
• Katrina-Stopping Nails: By re-engineering the nail, inventors were able to create a nail so strong that the roofs of houses no longer will sheer off in hurricane winds.
• Periodic Table: One of the editors of PopSci spent four years assembling a collection of elements for a real-life periodic table and photographing them. It's kinda cool to look at -- you can even order a poster of the table for your home or office enjoyment!
  
• Censored Hammer: Although not necessary revolutionary, I also read an article about a new hammer called the "FUBAR" which was designed for demolition work. Now tell me, how in the world did Stanley get away with that? I can picture 5 years olds watching their Dads hard at work and asking if they can have a try at the FUBAR.
  

Best Wiitie Ever.

My pet name for John is "Weetie" -- short for "Sweetie". That's not public knowledge, and he'll probably kill me for posting that here, but it's important that everyone know he is now "Wii-tie". This morning he told me he was getting up early to work on a car. So I sort of just grumbled a goodbye and went back to bed. When he got home around 11:30, he proceeded to tell me he had lied to me about where he was going and then produced a newly acquired Wii!

Apparently, he had to wait in line in the 20 degree weather for 3 hours for this thing. Now that's true love! So today will be spent learning how to play in between watching football with friends.

What a great Sunday!

Recent Cake.

Where I've Been...

I realize it's been a while since I've written something substantial on this thing. So I better fess up to what I've been doing for the past month or so.

December was fairly hectic. John and I hosted several parties and attended several parties. I was able to get together with the old HR Gang from Integic -- which was so incredibly awesome. We swapped stories and presents and had a grand time at my house. Bailey enjoyed being spoiled by them as he licked their plates clean. We attended the American Systems Christmas party which was a total joke compared to the Integic days, but had a moderately fun time. My brothers were able to come home for Christmas from Japan and Florida, and we had a great time hanging out. John's family came up from South Carolina for a while so we had a full house for about a week. After they left, I was suckered into having the Underwood Christmas party at my house. My Mom's 6 siblings, their spouses, and children came for food, fun and gift exchanges.

John and I exchanged gifts this year. Items of note would be a Pabst Blue Ribbon light up sign from the 1970s that I got off of eBay and a hydroponic herb garden for the kitchen.

For New's Years Eve, we went to Maryland to see Rob's band play. We were able to convince our neighbors, my brother, my cousin Emily and her boyfriend and Tommy to come with us. If it wasn't for Rob, I wouldn't have voluntarily stepped foot in Maryland, but I ended up having a good time all the same. Probably too good, because apparently there is video footage somewhere of me jumping on a trampoline with Rob's girlfriend after having about 8 drinks. Hm.

For the past few months, Rob and Jen and I have been holding a "Dawson's Creek/Wonder Years" night on Wednesdays. It usually consists of a bunch of dogs running around the house, cooking good food, and then us watching DC/WY and making fun of every other line in the show. So far, we have finished the first 2 seasons of both shows. It's a great break from real life in the middle of the week, so anyone who is interested, feel free to join us!

Other than that, work has been kicking my butt. I've been pretty swamped trying to take a department that has had 20 years of neglect and try and make it a fully functional environment where we are able to help grow the corporation into a billion dollar company. I have some awesome employees, so the good news is, I will not have to go it alone.

That's it for now. I must sign off so I can bake a cake for a 5 year old. It's a pony theme, but she doesn't want My Little Pony stuff. So I have to try and make a girlie pony that doesn't resemble a My Little Pony. Fun stuff.