This weekend with my blog down and all, I had to find other ways to amuse myself, and on Saturday night, Andy and I went swimming. Night swimming is always cool, but this time we turned the landscape lighting on, and the pool light off. It was a completely different atmosphere. The landscape lighting consists mostly of uplights on the tall palms and some lights angled toward tropical foliage and the light that illuminates the waterfall. With the pool light off the water was black and almost spooky in a cool sort of way. If you've ever been to Disney and been on the "Pirates of the Caribbean" ride there, that is what it reminded me of. I felt like I was swimming in that dark black water that surrounds the boats on the ride, illuminated by the dim ships lights. The only other time I remember swimming in such a a murky blackness was in Costa Rica many years ago when we went swimming in the ocean at night and whenever I would raise my arm out of the water it was glowing green, illuminated by the phosphorescent diatoms. Truly beautiful stuff. I look forward to a little night swimming again sometime soon.

You may not realize it, but it has been an awful weekend in the blogosphere for me. A series of unfortunate events conspired to take my site offlline for almost the whole weekend, and there was nothing I could do about it. It is absolutely amazing to see how much my blog is now a part of me- I was lost without it. It was like someone cut off my arm or something. I kept a little piece of paper and kept jotting down ideas for posts all weekend long so I wouldn't forget them. I kept refreshing the page over and over hoping the site would come back. It was depressing really. I had so many ideas, and I wanted to share. What would you do without your blog? Does it mean a lot to you, or is it something you could take or leave?

Update: The comments feature is currently not working. Please be patient with me and I will have it up and running again as soon as possible. Thank you.

Update update: All features of this blog (including commenting) are back online! Please, comment away!

Well not actually, but my beer haiku submission made it on Beer Haiku Daily today. So hop on over there and take a look.

Have you ever found out something about someone and then wished you hadn't? Someone told me that one of my co-workers was a registered sex offender, and I looked it up on the website. Sure as shit, there he was, photo and everything. The guy is actually very nice, and I don't know the circumstances at all. Maybe he was wrongly accused or something. I have no idea how he is allowed to work at the space center, because they do very thorough background checks and are constantly notified when employees get in any trouble with the law. They can pull clearances that are necessary for our jobs for things like DUIs, even.

Anyway, I just wish I didn't know about it. He is a nice person, and I have to work with him on occasion. He is one of our engineers, so I don't see him that often, but when I do, I can't get it out of my head about the sex offender thing. I am sure that it must really tear him up inside, knowing that his friends and co-workers might see it on the internet. I can't condemn him because like I said before, I really have no idea what happened. It just makes me sad to think about it.

One of my co-workers had a horrible thing happen to him yesterday. He has a lot of health problems, such as diabetes, neuropathies and some other things, but he can still walk around pretty much okay most of the time. He has to miss work fairly frequently due to his health and he he has no feeling in his feet at all. Well, he has a handicapped permit in his truck, and he really loves that truck and babies it like nothing else. Yesterday he pulled into a handicapped spot in front of the grocery store and walked up to the ATM to get some cash. By the time he got back to his truck, someone had keyed the hell out of it down to the bare metal. He is absolutely sick about it. Our assumption is that somone saw him park in the handicapped spot and then walk away, assumed that he was not handicapped and keyed his truck to make him "pay for it." I can't believe someone could be so cruel.

So far this has been a very good week for us, career-wise. Andy received a very special and important award at work last night, and this morning, I recieved a much smaller pat-on-the-back type of award. Andy won a Quest for Excellence monthly award which consists of a crystal trophy and a check for $500.00, less taxes of course. My award was an On-the-spot award and consisted of a certificate and two ten dollar American Express gift checks. Gotta start somewhere, huh?

I have known about Andy's award since June and had to keep it a secret, because I am on a board that chooses the winners (I did not vote on his nomination for ethical reasons). It just about killed me to keep my mouth shut about it for that long. Another neat thing about it is that it makes him eliglible for the really big awards at the end of the year, where he could get thousands of dollars, and we get to go to a big fancy banquet in the spring when they are presented.

Patrice tagged me on this so here goes.

Seven things I plan to do before I die:

Celebrate my 50th wedding anninversary
Attend a Stanley Cup hockey game
Go back to visit the Virgin Islands
Become a millionaire
Travel to Australia
Fire a gun
Have kids (I think)

Seven things I can do:

Paint in watercolor, acrylic, and oils
Take really good care of animals
Operate a mass spectrometer :)
Design tropical landscapes
Fly solo in an airplane
Make a mean quesadilla
Fix airplanes

Seven things I can't do:

play an instrument
hurt an animal
drive stick
eat bananas
sing well
dance
act

Seven things that attract me to the opposite sex:

ability to do laundry
intelligence
gentleness
honesty
smile
butt
eyes

Seven things I say most often:

Louie, NO! (the bad dog)
Honey, where are you?
What are you doing?
I love you
Damn
Shit
Fuck

Seven celebrity crushes:

Sorry to copy this from you Patrice, but I am not all that big on celebrities. If I had to pick one, it would be Simon Rex.

And finally, this meme branch dies with me, because there are so many of us running in the same circles here that people are bound to be double tagged otherwise.

Sorry everyone, but my site was down for a while last night due to necessary server upgrades. I didn't find out about the upgrades until after they started, so I hope it wasn't too much of an inconvenience for anyone. Thanks for coming back!

Last night was pretty bad. I was awakened by Andy at around 2:30 because my oldest dog, Ollie, was having a seizure of some kind. He is seventeen and a half years old and had never had a seizure before, so it was quite unexpected. He was flailing around as though he was upside down and trying to right himself, but he wasn't upside down. We had an epileptic dog before named Daisy, and one day she had what we thought was a seizure at first but it turned out to be a stroke, so I was concerned that Ollie could be having a stroke. I just restrained him in my lap and petted him to calm him down and after about forty minutes or so, he came out of it, so apparently it was a seizure. We sat with him for a while afterward to make sure he was going to be okay, and pretty soon it was four thirty and time for me to get up for work.

Andy called our vet this morning and he said it could have been an epileptic seizure, or caused by his heart fluttering or something cardiac related. He asked what color Ollie's tongue was during the attack, but it was dark and neither of us thought to look. There is nothing they can do for him unless he has another seizure within a month's time. Then they will put him on medication.

It is hard for me to think about the fact that Ollie probably won't be with me much longer. I am thirty and he is seventeen and a half- that means he has been with me most of my life. It is hard to imagine him not being around. Charley, our parrot, loves to call Ollie all the time. He says "Ollie! Ollie! Oliver!" and "Oliver, get out of here!" and that will be pretty sad to hear once he is not with us anymore. He has gotten so old, I almost miss him before he's even gone.

Okay, I just want to start by saying that I know a lot of people will disagree with me on this, but it is my blog, and I will say what I want.

We went to the grocery store this morning as usual, and I was irritated to see a group of tiny beggars outside of the entrance. You know what I mean; a group of kids that stands around the front of a store and begs for money for their activities such as cheerleading, scouting, or whatever. This is the absolute lowest form of fund raising ever, if you ask me. Hassling people who just want to go to the store to buy necesstities without being bothered. Now, I have nothing against charities and donating to good causes, but we choose our charities carefully each year, and we prefer to donate to established charities where the donations are tax deductible. We are constantly slammed with people asking for money over the phone, in the mail, on TV, in magazines, etc. and it starts to really annoy me when I can't even go to the store without being bothered. If we donated to everyone who begs for money, we would lose our fucking house! It is completely out of hand. Besides all that, what are we really teaching these kids by doing this? That if they want something they should stand around and beg for it? That is a really nice thing for them to learn. That way they will be well prepared for life on the streets. It is no wonder that we have so many problems in society with children who feel that they are "entitled" to anything they want.

Now I understand that these groups that beg have to raise money, because some of the parents can't afford for their children to participate otherwise. Well, have a car wash, have a bake sale, something, anything, but not begging! I really don't even like the bell ringers standing outside of stores during the holidays. I actually applaud Target stores for removing them, and then making an enormous donation to the Salvation Army that well exceeded the amount the bell ringers would have collected. Target seems to understand that shoppers don't want to be hassled every time they enter or exit the store. I would happliy make a much larger donation to the Salvation Army if they would not accost me in front of stores. Agree or disagree with me? Let's hear it!

Someone got me good. He thinks he's pretty funny, and I have to give him credit on this one. If you haven't read my post from earlier this week, Doing what others dream? stop now and go read it or the rest of this story will be lost on you.

Okay, so you've read the post about the license plate frames. Apparently so had one of my friends at work. There are only two people at work that know about this blog. I left work this afternoon to go just down the road to the on-site gym to work with a personal trainer. When I came out and walked back to my Jeep, I did a double-take. Was this my Jeep? With the hated license plate frame on it? It WAS!

We have been invaded. By frogs. Of the huge sticky-toed nocturnal variety and they are everywhere. Here is an excerpt from an article about the little beasts:

"The Cuban tree frog is a cousin to the little green tree frogs that stick to windows and sound like crickets in the night.

They were first noted in the United States about 80 years ago in the Florida Keys and have been migrating slowly north.

The invader eats other tree frogs and can take over their range.

'When it gets there, other tree frogs disappear,' Gibbons said. The Cuban tree frog also secretes a substance that causes a painful stinging sensation for humans."

Now I love frogs and all, really I do, but these things are really taking over. It is said that they will eat anything that they can cram into their mouths, even other slightly smaller Cuban tree frogs. I haven't seen a normal native tree frog in quite a while. This is the first year that we have seen Cuban tree frogs in this area, and it is amazing how fast they are spreading. They poop all over my house and porch furniture even after the agreement they made with me not to crap on my rocking chairs. I thought we had a deal, but they didn't hold up their end of the bargain.

When I see weather people on TV, I often think how it must be nice to be able to be wrong every single day and still be paid handsomely for it. Imagine if I screwed up at my job every day, or even once, ever? People could die. The same is true for doctors and there are harsh consequences for a lot of other professions as well.

This was also true of my former job as an aircraft mechanic. If I screwed up, people might die. If I did a good job and maybe found and fixed something potentially catastrophic, everything was fine and good, but no one was out patting me on the back or anything. It was just my job. Now consider this, if a firefighter saves someone's life, he is really just doing his job, isn't he? If he does his job correctly and saves a life, he is considered a hero. Does that make an aircraft mechanic who found and fixed a problem with a plane even more of a hero because potentially even more lives were saved? No. Not in most people's minds. And if a firefighter has a bad day and doesn't do his job well, everyone just says that sadly they were unable to rescue the victim. If an aircraft mechanic messes up or misses something and a plane goes down, then he is considered a murderer and can even go to jail for his mistake. Many mechanics that have messed up in some way have committed suicide out of guilt after an aircraft accident. It is kind of interesting to think about, but the firefighter is just an example, I don't have anything against firefighters at all. What are the consequences if you mess up at your job? Do you ever get to be a hero because of something you do at work?

The lottery came to Florida when I was in high school. My dad used to say it was a "voluntary tax." I have never really been a big lottery player. I would play once in a while, here and there, but only a couple times a year. I actually sort of swore off the lottery in the summer of 2002, wherein I decided that I would not play the lottery anymore, but would establish an anti-lottery fund. I started having fifteen bucks a week deducted from my paycheck toward purchasing company stock (I work for a NASA contractor made up of a conglomerate of companies) instead of playing the lottery. It is still sort of gambling, but not as much so as I get Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Rockwell Automation stocks every week. They are now worth over four grand, so it hasn't been a bad plan after all.

But back to the lottery. The jackpot has gotten high this week, and at work a few people have gone in together in a pool. They asked me if I wanted in, and I couldn't say no for a selfish reason. Since I am part of the pool I know we won't win for I am not a lucky type. However if I hadn't joined after being asked, they would have most certainly won without me, and I would have kicked myself for the next ten years for it. So, to avoid the kicking, I had to give it a shot. So, to the rest of the lottery pool, I am sorry that I have ruined your chances of winning, but I couldn't let you win without me.

This may sound silly, but there are these license plate frames that really bug me. They are on the cars of some of the people who work at the space center with me and they say "Space Shuttle Team" on the top, and "Doing What Others Dream" on the bottom. Now I ask you, isn't that just the tiniest bit pretentious? I find it both obnoxious and snobby at the same time. Granted we are all lucky to be employed out there and to be part of something so big, but to flaunt it that way just reads tacky to me.

There is also the fact that while our launches are highly publicized, our day to day work is actually quite mundane. I have been known to turn to a co-worker and say "is this the part others are dreaming of?" because some things just suck, like at any other job. Now don't get me wrong, I love my job, but that is exactly what it is, a job, and therefore it becomes routine like anyone else's job after a while. It is my personal opinion that pretty much any job becomes routine after a while, no matter how exciting it seems at first. Agree or disagree? Let's hear it!

I am a major tortilla addict. You may remember me mentioning that Andy said I was going to TURN INTO a quesadilla. I make burritos, wrap sandwiches, soft tacos, quesadillas and so on with my wonderful tortillas. A few weeks back I almost had to hurt someone at the grocery store because they stopped carrying my precious tortillas, the Mission brand low carb whole wheat kind. I searched four other grocery stores to no avail! After a few weeks, they finally got some in, but they were gone quickly and were not restocked. I finally went to the store manager and told him that I must have these very tortillas, and that they must be here every week! Well the grocery manager at Publix (yay Publix!) came through for me- he even called the house to tell me they were in, and gave me two packs of them for free! I know he must have thought I was nuts, as certainly you all do now, but I am happy.

So that brings me to another great source of tortilla induced happiness I stumbled on today. This great book, "101 Things To Do With A Tortilla". The title sounds almost dirty if you think about it too much. But inside are all kinds of neat recipe ideas; breakfast lunch, dinner, appetizers and even desserts. There are recipes for tortilla soups, wraps, rolls, stacks, casseroles, and more. I can't wait to try them.

What about you? Is there something you can't live without at the grocery store? One item whose absence might make you go postal? Let's hear it!

My sister Alison, turns twenty-six today, so everyone wish her a happy birthday. I can't believe she's twenty-six! I always think of her as so little; the little brat that used to bug me all the time. It amazed me when she hit certain milestones, like driving, getting married (she was married before I was!) and having kids. She has two beautiful children and they are growing up so fast. Well, happy birthday Alison, and try not to get old so fast, because I am five years ahead of you and I want to slow down!

Okay, so you've found it! Here is my new home; I hope you like it. Like I said before there are still some issues being worked on, but I needed to direct everyone here so their comments would not be left on my other page. There are still some minor changes to come, though. And I like it better in Firefox than in Internet Explorer. If you haven't tried Mozilla Firefox yet, you should!

Lately, everyone at work is getting new vehicles. I guess the prices are pretty good right now if you are loking to buy a new car or truck. Maybe I am crazy, but I really don't want a new car. I am driving a 2000 Jeep Wrangler Sahara and it still feels like a new car to me despite the fact that I have had it longer than any other vehicle I have ever owned. I had reason to celebrate earlier this year when it finally was mine. I made the last payment and I completely own it now. Andy's truck is ours too. It is so nice not to have any car payments, and both of us want to keep what we are driving for a while. One of the less nice things about keeping a car past the time when it is paid for is that it requires expensive maintenance. Yuck. I hate going to have anything done on my Jeep because it is pain in the ass and I find it hard to trust anyone. This morning we dropped off Jimmie (my Jeep) and got it aligned, rotated, new shocks and new brakes. The cost was quite painful and I had to remind Andy that at least it was only a little more than one car payment on a new car would be. Tomorrow he is getting new tires and a bunch of other stuff done on his truck. Oh the joys of having paid off vehicles!

It all started in the summer of 93. I was to be entering my second year of college at Florida State University in Tallahassee, Florida, where I also happened to grow up. I was still friends with some of my high school friends, Lisa, a year ahead of me in school, and Hilary, a year behind me in school. The three of us found a house to rent for the year, actually Lisa found it, and what a house. The house was located very near to Doak Campbell Stadium (FSU's football stadium) and was on Prince Street, a street of older homes that were commonly rented to college students. It was owned by a rather eccentric woman, named Karin (pronounced Car-in) Ostlund, and she had painted the whole house inside and out in the craziest way- see the photos below. We as young college students thought it was cool and would make a neat party house. Karin was weird, but she assured us that she was moving to Albuquerque in a couple of weeks and we would just put the rent in the mailbox. It sounded like an okay deal, and we gave her a deposit and first months rent and soon moved in. Karin told us she would be staying in the garage until her move. She told us it was an efficiency apartment in there. Stupidly, we took her word for it.

Well, shortly after we moved in, we started noticing some odd things. Karin was always hanging around, creeping out our friends and doing strange things. She would be up in the middle of the night, sneaking around painting the outside of the house even more strangely than before, so that we would wake up to a real surprise. The entire outside of the house changed colors and patterns several times. She painted some strange symbols on the garage door and told us they were messages from Neptune.

Karin stayed in the garage week after week. It seemed that she wasn't going to move to Albuquerque. She would skulk around the house and listen to our conversations. She would crawl under the house and spy on us there, too. We could smell the smoke of her hand rolled cigarettes coming up through the floorboards. When she saw us, she would say little things to us to let us know that she had been listening in. She would bring up things from our private conversations to creep us out. We had discussed one night that we needed a way to lock the windows, since all of the window locks were broken. We decided we should drill a hole in the wooden window frames where they overlapped, and then we could put a pin or a large nail in there to effectively lock the windows shut. The next morning, Karin handed us a box of large nails and said "these are for you to lock the windows with" and walked away. She would also water the backyard incessantly. It was raining every afternoon that summer, so it certainly didn't need watering. We kept turning the hose off, and she would turn it back on. We went through 27,000 gallons of water in one month.

Things get fuzzy in my memory after that. I remember that something scary happened with Karin while Lisa and I were home, but I don't remember what exactly it was. Lisa called the police and they came out and found a mud covered Karin creeping around under the house. Their advice to us was "get out of here." After that we found out that Karin was mentally ill, duh, and her parents had bought the house for her to live in. They never intended for her to rent it out. She was just a nut. We ended up losing our deposit and moving out, not wanting to deal with the insanity. But I am sure none of us will ever forget Karin Ostlund and the house on Prince Street. I wonder if she is still there, doing the same thing to other unsuspecting college students.

All week long, I was planning to take the day off on Friday. I had a very important training session that I couldn't miss on Monday, Tuesday I had a task to complete, Wednesday I had a meeting I had to go to, and I was scheduled for a training class that night, but since I am no longer on second shift, I rearranged it to take someone's place in the same class on Thursday morning, still leaving Friday clear. Or so I thought. Until Thursday morning when I checked the training schedule and saw that the class was actually on Friday, the wonderful day that I was going to take off. So, I dutifully went in to work, and wouldn't you know it, I forgot my damn tortillas for my wrap sandwiches AGAIN! I am completely losing it. Then later, I got home and thought I would go for a nice swim, and after getting in the pool and skimming all the junk out of it and testing the chemical levels in the water, it started thundering and lightning to the point that I had to get out and go inside or risk a lightning strike. Then it proceeded to rain 1.14 inches in the next half hour. It is just not my day.

Sorry for the weak posts lately, but I have been really tired lately. Working a different shift than Andy is tough- he gets home in the middle of my night of sleep, and of course the dogs bark and it disrupts my sleep. Having to get up at the same super early time even on the weekends to give my poor diabetic dog his shots is quite taxing too. I dream so much some nights that I feel as if I haven't slept at all. It doesn't help either that I have Fibromyalgia which is very similar to Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, except with some other extra fun symptoms. I just wish I could stop yawning sometimes. And I hate it when people say that I look tired. It is like saying "you look like shit" to tell someone that they look tired. So, I try to post every day but if some days I don't quite make it, well, forgive me, but I am just tired.

This morning I found a copy of this article which was published in the NewYork Post in my e-mail at work. It ties in very nicely with my previous post's rant, so I have posted it here for everyone to read. It was distributed to my husband from one of his managers at work, with the tagline, "Finally, a lucid voice in the wilderness."

Eugene F. Kranz, author of "Failure Is Not an Option: Mission Control From Mercury to Apollo 13 and Beyond," is a former Apollo flight director.

"To read and listen to the coverage of the ongoing mission of Space Shuttle Discovery, you would think NASA's mission team have taken careless risks with the lives of the seven astronauts who went into space last Tuesday. During the launch, foam fell off the external tank. For the risk-averse, the only acceptable thing to do now is retire the shuttle program immediately and wait for the divine arrival of the next generation of spacecraft. I am disgusted at the lack of courage and common sense this attitude shows.

All progress involves risk. Risk is essential to fuel the economic engine of our nation. And risk is essential to renew American's fundamental spirit of discovery so we remain competitive with the rest of the world. My take on the current mission is very straightforward. The shuttle is in orbit. To a great extent mission managers have given the spacecraft a clean bill of health. Let us remember that this is a test flight. I consider it a remarkably successful test so far.

The technical response to the Columbia accident led to a dramatic reduction in the amount of debris striking this shuttle during launch. Mission managers have said that the external tank shed 80 percent less foam this time than on previous launches. Only in the news media, apparently, is an 80 percent improvement considered a failure. Rather than quit, we must now try to reduce even more greatly the amount of foam that comes off the tank.

The instruments and video equipment developed to assess the launch performance and monitor debris falling from the tank worked superbly. For the first time, the mission team knows what is happening, when it is happening and the flight conditions under which it occurred. This was a major mission objective, and it is an impressive achievement.

Having spent more than three decades working in the space program, I know that all of the flights of the early days involved some levels of risk. Some of those risks, in hindsight, seem incomprehensible by today's timid standards. If we had quit when we had our first difficulties in Project Mercury, we would have never launched John Glenn on the Atlas rocket Friendship 7 in 1961. Two of the previous five Atlas rockets test-fired before Friendship 7 had exploded on liftoff.

On Gemini 9, 10 and 11, all in 1966, we had complications with planned spacewalks that placed the astronauts at risk. Rather than cancel the walks, we faced the risks and solved the problems. These set the stage for Gemini 12 later that year, during which Buzz Aldrin spent more than five hours outside the capsule and confirmed to NASA that spacewalks could be considered an operational capability.

Eventually, this capability enabled astronauts to retrieve satellites and repair and maintain the Hubble space telescope; and during the current mission, spacewalks were used to repair a gyroscope on the International Space Station and will allow the crew to fix some of the damage on that occurred during the launch. These are the rewards for the risks we took on those early Gemini flights.

I understand the tragedy inherent in risk-taking; I witnessed the fire aboard Apollo that killed its three crew members. It filled us with anger at ourselves and with the resolve to make it right. After the fire we didn't quit; we redesigned the Apollo command module. During the Apollo missions that followed, we were never perfect. But we were determined and competent and that made these missions successful.

I see the same combination of anger, resolve and determination in the Space Shuttle program today. These people are professionals who understand the business of risk, how to reduce risk and making that which remains acceptable. Most important, the current mission has demonstrated the maturity of the shuttle team that went through the tragedy of Columbia and had the guts to persevere. This is the most important aspect of the recovery from the Columbia accident, and is a credit to the great team NASA now has in place, headed by its administrator, Michael Griffin.

There are many nations in the world that wish to surpass us in space. Does the "quit now" crowd really believe that abandoning the shuttle and International Space Station is the way to keep America the pre-eminent space-faring nation? Do they really believe that a new spacecraft will come without an engineering challenge or a human toll? The path the naysayers suggest is so out of touch with the American character of perseverance, hard work and discovery that they don't even realize the danger in which they are putting future astronauts. Not to mention our nation."

The lovely and talented Allison of AP's Blog asked a very interesting question and I am going to make a new post out of it because it brings up some interesting points.

She asked:

"What is going on with those repairs in space? will they be able to fix them? what if they can't? how will they get back?"

My reply was:

"Allison, don't worry about the repairs in space. Those gap fillers are so inconsequential that I can't even believe they are trying to fix them. They would be better off just leaving them hanging. The shuttle has always had things that come loose and it lands with missing tiles all the time, it is just that this time we have the cameras so we can see it all. I think that the only reason they are doing the repairs is to test the repair techniques and because the media has been so critical. The media is definitely the enemy of human spaceflight. Do not take what you hear on TV about the space program at face value, because a lot of it is bad information or just crap."

She replied:

"I agree with you that the media is crap.....the only reason I asked was because they've really "sensationalized" the whole story...ie: going into worst case scenarios, etc.."

This brings up how screwed up the media in this country is. In terms of the space program, our own local newspaper is one of the worst, always gloom and doom about NASA and then they call themselves the "Space Coast Newspaper." How dare they! The TV stations are no better. They are all looking for a sensational story and will twist information use worst case scenarios, and take many liberties to "make" their stories. It disgusts me. The space program is something to be proud of and the way they report, they want us to fail so they can be more famous and popular. It is not just the space program though. I noticed last year with all of the hurricanes that the reporters on the Weather Channel seemed actually disappointed when certain hurricanes did not cause as much distruction as predicted. They hung their heads almost in disappointment! Unreal! The guys on one radio show I listen to sometimes said that they were out at Jacksonville Beach one time when a hurricane was coming, and there was a TV crew there filming the hurricane coverage. The news anchor was standing in front of a sign on the beach and somone was crouched below him shaking the sign to make it look like the wind was blowing really hard. This is the kind of sensationalist crap we see every day, whether we know it or not.

Which brings me to this, which I posted as a comment on the very interesting Tom's Astronomy Blog, on a post he wrote about the media stating that NASA had "grounded" the shuttle fleet:

Technically, according to NASA, the shuttle is grounded everytime it lands, as it is not like an aircraft that has an airworthiness certificate issued that is good for many flights. The airworthiness is determined separately for each fight, and all they have said is that we will not fly until the problem is fixed. It is the same effect as a grounding, but technically a little different. I call it "grounded" as well, as it is pretty much the same thing.

The media loves to take hold of a word or phrase and use it whether or not they know what it means. This is just one more example of the utter ridiculousity of it all.

Anyways, so whenever you hear something like "will a hacksaw repair determine the end of the space shuttle program?" (I actually heard something to that effect today), keep in mind that the media is made up of a bunch of people who want us to fail because it makes for better news.

Thank you for your continued support.

Oh, and everyone go visit Allison's and Tom's blogs. They are both very cool.

Today at work, one of my crazy co-workers, Pat, was telling us about how his daughter used to drive him nuts by leaving the milk out. This was when she was about thirteen. She would have a bowl of cereal late at night, and was forever leaving the milk out on the table all night and it would spoil. One Saturday morning Pat woke up and found an almost full gallon of milk on the kitchen table, warm. He stormed to his daughter's room, yanked the covers back and yelled "You left the milk out, now go get it!" He forced her to carry than darn jug of warm milk around all day- she had to keep her hand on it at all times for her punishment. He even rounded up the family to take them out for lunch and to the mall, and the milk went too. I can't even imagine the humiliation! He said that afternoon she went outside and was sitting on the front curb, hand on milk jug, just to get away from him, she was so mad. She never left the milk out again, though.

Today is the first anniversary of the day that I started this blog. I guess it doesn't really count because I posted for about a month and then completely abandoned it for quite a few months because I had no readers. For some reason I got back to it in April, and have been posting almost every day since then. And now I have readers! It is funny to look back at the old posts because they suck so badly! I guess it takes most people a while to find their blogging "style." It certainly did for me (I'm still not sure that I am there yet!).

What about you? How has your blog evolved from the beginning? What made you want to blog in the first place? Have you found a comfortable "style" of writing or are you just taking each post as it comes?

Once again I will mention that Andy and I are officers of our neighborhood's Home Owners Association or HOA. President and secretary/treasurer respectively. The only other officer is Brian, and he is just well, rabid lately. He is part of the reason that Andy and I are getting out of it after this year.

There is a house across the street from us and over to the right a bit that is a vacation rental. It rents out by the week and is extremely well kept, better even than when it was owner occupied. This weekend, the renters had a fairly large (but very nice) boat parked in the driveway, and it was in less than twelve hours that Brian was already calling us, bitching about it. It was almost funny because as soon as we saw the boat Andy said to me "how long do you think it will be before Brian starts bitching?" It turned out that it was not very long at all. He called us wanting the owner of the house's telephone number. They live up in Illinois somewhere and I don't know if we have their number or not but we told him we didn't. The boat was gone in less than 24 hours anyway, they were apparently just keeping it there overnight. Even still, I wouldn't have cared if it was there all week. Brian just needs to get a life. He is a single engineer of around forty or so years old, and I don't think he even dates. That is most likely his problem- he needs to get laid or something. He has way too much energy to get so fired up about the most mundane things. He is a true HOA "Nazi" lately and I want no part of it. He pissed off the residents of one house so much already that they set off firecrackers and pitched them at his house as they drove by. Not the kind of act that I want to inspire personally. Only a few more months and we will let Brian and his SS (he will have to do some recruiting) take over completely. I can't wait.