I just want everyone to know that Adam Carola is Dead WRONG when it comes to community college. (Okay, well he may have a point in some instances but I’m not willing to discuss that here.) Who is Adam Carola? Adam Carola is famous for various radio and TV programs including: The Man Show, Love Line, and 107.77 The Endd’s morning show. What is Adam Carola dead wrong about? Adam Carola is dead wrong about his oppion regarding community college. He refers to it (insultingly) as junior college and thinks that people who are enrolled there are idots/losers. I am here to say that the instructors are knowledgable and articulate. I wasn’t sure they would be before I had my first class. I finally had my first classes last week. I had Word 2 and my first Excell class. I had know idea how little I knew about Word. I’m going to be practicing skills on my own because there’s no way I could remember everything we’ve done in class. But I just wanted to say you can learn something there if you want to. In other news, I have my sub ap in for my home town and have an orientation there on Wed. I applied another job with help from my mom, my cuz, and his wife. Does she ever blog here btw? Can anyone send me monkey Dr.’s email?
I’m starting a DIY category because well I like DIY projects and even though I never get around to the zillions of ideas I have hopefully we’ll all be encouraged by each other’s occasional projects!
As many of you know (and a few of you experienced first hand ((and by that i mean ekbo))) I inherited a massive spice collection from miz frances and I had no idea how I would arrange said spices. Refer to exhibit A:
As you can see this area is a total mess and I have lost valuable counter space. And I can’t find anything. And the mess just makes me walk away from the kitchen any time I think about cooking (ok, so a few times I’ve been able to talk myself out of ordering pizza, but it was HARD to face those spices like that!).
After looking for ways to expand my wall ikea spice rack (they stopped making that whole line of products a while back so no attachments or extensions, damn!) and then abandoning that for a whole new plan that was much too expensive for my taste I decided to go it alone.
Exhibit B: My ikea rack is scooted to the left to make room for a magnetic strip system for my new spices. Happily, I already had baby food jars from frances and chat, and then I got a few more from one of mark’s coworkers, so all I needed were the metal strips and some magnets. Viola, massive wall of spices!
It’s probably not the most ideal place to put them – herbs and spices should really be kept in a cool dark place instead of in clear jars above the stove but for me this works.
WHEN THIS IS OVER
Name: CAPT Lee Kelley
Posting date: 3/29/07
Returned from: Iraq
Milblog url: wordsmithatwar.blog-city.com
Email: wordsmith16@excite.com
When this is over, take my weapon. I won’t need it for a while. Take this body armor. I would look silly wearing it at the beach. Witness as I grow a goatee. And watch me indulge, at least for a while, in fast food, massive amounts of sleep, alcohol, channel-surfing and many other things that I have lived without for long enough now that I remember liking them more than I actually do.
I have two wonderfully resilient children to whom I’ve dedicated my life, and who will one day soon forget that their Dad was gone for so long. They won’t notice if I’m gone another day or two.
So just drop me off when this is over.
I truly appreciate all the support, but I don’t need parades or awards or speeches from the governor. I don’t even need a ride. Just leave me on any interstate that has a friendly shoulder with nice loose gravel to kick at, or in a subway car full of morning New York commuters, or in a hotel room looking out at the arch in downtown St. Louis. Leave me in Atlanta, or Portland, Ore., Gig Harbor, Wash., or in a lighthouse on the coast of Maine. I’ll gladly be dropped off anywhere in North Dakota, Maryland, Alabama, or Florida. How about a rest area in Flagstaff, Ariz., or a four-way stop in Twin Falls, Idaho? I’ll be fine on my own, whether you leave me in a quiet forest, at a state fair, or in the middle of a mosh pit.
I have a lot of friends and family, but rather than going from a combat environment straight back to my block in suburban America, I’d prefer a small period of complete privacy, surrounded only by the elements.
Leave me on a ridge in the Smoky Mountains of North Carolina or a canyon in the Colorado Rockies. I’ll find a nice walking stick that is well-balanced and has the perfect spot, worn of bark, for my right hand. I’ll hike the rest of the trip.
In the wide open spaces of America you’ll find me, walking across the Golden Gate Bridge lost in thought, skipping rocks at the Pacific Coast, having breakfast in a small cafe in Vermont, or lying on a South Carolina beach in the glare of the setting sun on the tide-washed shore.
You may see me huddled against a 1,000-foot rock precipice near Dead Horse Point outside of Moab, Utah, a lone figure silhouetted by my campfire, feeding sticks into the flames, captivated with observations of the universe.
Or I’ll be the man fishing near you on Lake Hermitage, La.
“Catch anything?” you’ll ask.
“You bet. Some big trout on the west end of the lake, and some nice Redfish if you go for the bottom around that inlet right there.” I’ll say this as I point over my shoulder. Then I’ll wave, throttle the engine and move away for a better spot. The spray will fan out behind me, catching the sun as my prop churns the warm dark water.
As you stand looking down into the Grand Canyon, a sun visor on your head, a Gatorade bottle in one hand and a tourist pamphlet in the other, which also has three fingers wrapped around the railing because the depth perception is giving you vertigo, someone will ask “Amazing, isn’t it?” then smile and walk away. That will be me.
I’m the guy sitting on the H of the Hollywood sign, smoking a cigarette. I’m a face you can only see half of through the Medieval art display in your local museum. I’m an illegible name scribbled in the guest book of the St. Louis Cathedral in New Orleans. I am the happy drunk man talking to his slot machine in Vegas. I am the dad playing Frisbee with two children at a neighborhood park in Minneapolis. And I am the guy sitting next to you in English Lit class at the University of Montana, or the owner of a hand sticking out of a car that waves you to go first at a stop sign on your way home from work.
I am still focused on this mission and proud to be serving in Iraq with such incredible people. But in quiet moments of introspection I am becoming fixated on my life beyond this war, beyond this uniform. The thought of being with my children is a kinetic force, and the pure unadulterated momentum of inspiration grows each time the sun spans from East to West in syncopation with these oft monotonous minutes. The beauty of my America compels me with a newly discovered pentameter, like a favorite poem I haven’t read in years. And the perceived difficulty of picking up the pieces of my life there is a welcome challenge.
I’m a man on the cusp of the rest of his life, standing between war and family life, citizen and soldier, officer and parent, participant and observer. I’m about to step across a line, and I simply want to be deliberate about the process, that’s all.
Don’t mind me as I walk past you on the Appalachian Trail at dusk some summer evening soon, when the light is fading behind the hills in the distance. Everyone will be hiking back to their cars, and I’ll be hiking in. We both will smile casually and keep going in opposite directions. Tomorrow I may be in Texas. The next day I may see you in California.
So when this thing is over, just drop me off on American soil and bid me farewell. Maybe I’ll honk the horn as I pass by you on a highway in Utah where the Rocky Mountains frame the path to futurity and the landscape is welcoming like an old couch. I’ll be just another American on the road, wearing aerodynamic sunglasses and listening to the radio. Soon I’ll park in front of my children’s school and check them out early.
Oh yes, this is where it all begins.
Originally published by the New York Times
Drunk man parks horse in German bank
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
BERLIN — An early-morning German bank customer had a bit of a shock when he found a horse already in line at the automatic teller machine in front of him. It seems the horse’s owner, identified only as Wolfgang H., had a bit too much to drink the night before and decided to sleep it off inside the bank’s heated foyer, police said Tuesday.
The 40-year-old machinist told Bild newspaper he had had “a few beers” with a friend in Wiesenburg, southwest of Berlin, and decided to hit the hay in the bank on his way home.
“It was late, it was already dark and cold,” he was quoted as saying.
Confronted with the lack of a hitching-post, he brought the 6-year-old horse, named Sammy, in along with him.
When a customer came across the horse and sleeping rider in the bank at 4:15 a.m. Monday, he called police, who then came and woke the owner up and sent him on his way.
No charges were filed, but there might be some cleanup needed: Apparently Sammy made his own after-hours deposit on the carpet.
http://www.myspace.com/cheesyswissmama
i feel like a thirteen year old!
so i have a new favorite soda. lavender soda from this company called Dry Soda (www.drysoda.com). ok i just checked out the website and it’s hilarious. it’s got recipes and serving tips just like wines.
it claims to be all natural which is cool but even cooler is a soda that’s lavender flavored. i know that many people don’t like lavender as a food product but i’m all for it. in fact, as soon as my lavender bush produces some flowers i’m going to dry them and make lavender biscotti.
i got to visit with sara and little miss lila on thursday and it was a grand time! lila is still so very small. and cute. and beautiful. and strong and smart (per our conversation about gender stereotyping with reactions to babies). both baby and mom are doing well and mom seems totally relaxed and is digging the “wow i need to take care of another human being” thing, yay! here are a few pics.
lila in her woof woof shirt – blue to defy gendered colors!
here i caught her yawning but doesn’t it look like she’s shouting, “mom, STOP trying to wake me up!!!”
cute baby face. i think she looks a lot like sara. but i can never tell these things for sure. anyway, we had a good time gossiping and cooing over the NEW center of attention!
Not sure what category this belongs in – not rants tho, woo-hoo? Sorry it’s a downer tho…
So I have been reading some about the terrible shootings at Virginia Tech on Monday – especially today as more is known about the victims and NBC received and released info from the shooter. I think the story that most stood out for me is that of the professor who tried to block the door to his room – with his body - long enough to let his students escape out the windows. He was killed. I don’t know how many of his students he saved, but his family said they soon began receiving messages from the man’s students crediting him with saving their lives. How ironic? (Maybe not the rite word) One human doing the only thing he could in the moment to save people, the other doing all he could to kill them.
The big grin is the best part — I wonder if Clinton noticed the shirt. See the picture on flickr for more….