transportation

found some cheap gas today. it's kind of sad having to pay sooo much for gas. i used to ride my bike everywhere. hell! i didn't even get a drivers license till i was 24.
i remember when i bought my car my father told me that a 4 cylinder was sooo slow and he hates getting stuck behind one coming onto the freeway. but now i say ha!!
i love my fuel efficient little wagon. holds the whole family and our dog very comfortably. also we only have one car. pat rides his bike to work everyday. 10 miles. of course corvallis is flat as a pancake. it's a really smooth ride. he likes it a lot. and when we buy a new home we want to be closer to everything. also the bus is awesome. pat is free and all summer long the kids are free. i am .75 cents. and the kids think their on a ride at disneyland. they are super excited. seriously. they LOVE the bus.

it was scarry riding around oakland, san francisco and even berkeley. i had death threats. people would throw garbage at me. once an opened poopie diaper. GROSS!
folks here are pretty mellow. almost everyone rides a bike. fat, skinny, old, young, even folks that watch tv all day and eat mc donalds for a regular meal ride their bike. sometimes i feel like i'm in europe.
oh!! the best thing about this town is there are the sensors built into the ground. even for bikes. so if your at a red light your never there for more then a minute. it trips the lights. i love it. why don't they have these everywhere. i have sat at red lights for what seemed like 10-20 minutes before. i mean talk about road rage. i wanted to kill someone before the light turned green. so nice to be out of the rat race!

my newest projest

we have inherited a very nice table and chairs from pats mom.
it's solid oak and round (i like round things)
the problem is it's really dark. kind of boring.
so i've decided to paint it! all 7 chairs and the huge round table.
this is taking forever. i am done with 2 chairs and the table is almost finished.
and it's been 2 1/2 weeks. no kidding. of course i have 2 smaill kids so...
i wanted to be done before lisa (pats mom) comes for a visit. which is aug 9th.
not gonna happen.
she's gonna flip and probable try to take it back. no no i'll say.

here are some before and after pictures. the purple and green chairs.
the lighting is kind of off in the photo. the chairs are going to be all different colors.
one will be green, purple, blue, pink and 3 will be yellow.
the table will be yellow as well. the colors are very faint pastel.

this ones for ruth

Some College Kids Say They Get High Before Watching "Yo Gabba Gabba!"

The Nickelodeon series, a mix of animated shorts and live action, aims to teach kids important life lessons, such as why it's good to eat vegetables and how to make their beds.But it's not just a hit among the crayon-wielding, sticky-fingered crowd that the producers originally intended the show for.An older demographic — college students and many parents of preschoolers — has become just as, if not more, obsessed with "Yo Gabba Gabba!" as the toddlers who the show is aimed at.Georgia Southern University sophomore James Kicklighter told ABCNews.com that he and his friends meet to watch "Yo Gabba Gabba!" three times a week.

stress diet

in case you're feeling stressed this week...
This is a specially formulated diet designed to
help women cope with the Stress that
builds during the day.

Breakfast
1 grapefruit
1 slice whole wheat toast
1 cup skim milk

Lunch
1 small portion lean, steamed chicken
1 cup spinach
1 cup herbal tea
1 Hershey's kiss

Afternoon Tea
The rest of the Hershey Kisses in the bag
1 tub of Hagen-Daaz ice cream with
chocolate chips

Dinner
4 glasses of wine (red or white)
2 loaves garlic bread
1 family size supreme pizza
3 Snickers Bars

Late Night Snack
1 whole Sarah Lee cheesecake
(eaten directly from the freezer)

nasty dan

night night

are kids are probably like all the other kids in the world, they hate going to bed.
the routine there ok with. brushing teeth putting on p.j.'s.
it's the falling asleep part that is just so painfully drawn out.
especially my sweet little (sarcasm) sophie. everything in the world seems
to happen before she can fall asleep. my hip hurts, i'm not tired,
can i watch a movie first? when i finally convince her it's still a struggle,
first she needs like a couple LONG (wordy) books at least.
she will bargain here and somehow i'm always reading more then i came in with.
then she needs me to tell her a soothing made up story.
right now it's about a cat that has to be free. he skipped town and is riding the rail across oregon.
sophie loves the adventures he gets into.
luckily i have a pretty good imagination. and so does she.
like the story about the wayward hummingbird that got pregnant too early.
(she was a teenager) had her babies too early and they froze on the tree limb each night.
which kind of happened outside sophie's window. but it was ok, as sophie puts it.
she had another "litter" this time in the spring. and they turned out ok.
so back to the night night routine. sophie will cry out to me.
and thanks to our friend for giving us this book called mama llama red pajama.
she yells "mama llama" like the llama in the book. she thinks it's funny.
i'm not amused. very cute book. but i'm not a llama.
"what is it sophie?" i say. "i'm cold"
so i put her blanket on and before i leave her tiny room she kicked it off in a huff.
i leave. 5 minutes later "mama llama" "yes sophie" i say.
"i had a nightmare" she looks so desperate.
"you can't have a night mare if you don't fall asleep" i say logically.
then she gets mad at me, "you don't believe me" in an angry tone.
"sophie i'm tired i'm going to bed soon too,
lets see who can fall asleep faster." then this totally back fires.
"if you're going to bed too then lets cuddle each other to sleep." damn! "sophie i have to do dishes first."
i saw quickly and try to rush out the room. "mama!!!" she screams. "i'm cold"

“because a woman’s worth is based on her breasts and thighs …”

a staffer on obama's campaign had the now popularized hillary meal picture on his desk top. for those who cannot get the link, it says "Hillary Meal Deal: Two large thighs, two small breasts and a bunch of left wings. $666."

right, because the worth of a woman's leadership is in how big her breasts or small her thighs are, right? never mind the fact that she is a senator or has experience with working in both national and international politics …she's a woman, and thus is reduced down to what she her body offers.

so apparently a woman can be as powerful as ever, and still, the judgment of her worth is her body …but funny, when was the last time we saw an ad for a man as having a small cock? i don't see ads for dennis kuncinich's meal deal, with a small cock and a bunch of nuts anywhere …

why? because he is a man. rather than focusing on real campaign issues, this staffer is playing tongue-in-cheek politics based at devaluing a woman based on her body.

"If you choose between the lesser of two evils, at the end of the day, you still have evil."- Ralph Nader

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2008/01/02/whillary102.xml

cherry harvest '08

we have a "rogue" cherry tree in our back yard taller then a 3 story building. so you can only guess we have a million cherries right now. today as the kids played in the back yard pat got on the roof and picked cherries. then we cleaned them up and now i have like 500 or more cherries. i'm thinking cherry jam something i can can. if you have a good recipe (no sugar added) please pass it on. we still haven't hit up the blackberries and we're just eating the blueberries right off the bush. yum yum.

girls and boys

my good friend here in corvallis has 3 boys and a lot of hot wheels. and thomas trains.
we hang out all the time and mac loves her 4 year old son kai.
but i feel bad for sophie she clings to the only girl toy in the whole house a 3 inch dora doll, it has a frilly skirt and all.
every now and then she finds her groove and plays with the "boy" toys. i thought i was so fortunate having a girl and a boy. most of my friends kids are in pairs. lots of boys. she does have fun bossing him around and playing house with kai, he likes to be the mom too. so there are 2 moms when they play. and mac of course is the baby.
sophie is all girl! dresses, dolls, and she is super artistic. draws and sings all the time. dances around like a drunk Stevie Nicks doing some sort of rain dance in the garden. scarfs and bandannas rainbows, you get the picture right? also she is very opinionated with her music. no raffi for her she like female vocalist, mostly a cappella songs. or little instruments. she's a big strings fan. so she tends to like some country music most. dark and creepy country music. like feist. or gillian welsh.
mac likes to grab a dinosaur and chase her around growling and hitting. sophie will get into it, but then a polly pocket will appear and tame the wild beast. and it will turn into a tea party. and mac gets mad.
then i have to separate them bla bla bla...
i always thought it would be different. i wouldn't put these girlie restrictions on her.
no pink etc. and guess what her favorite color is. i dressed her in blue on purpose when she was a baby. and i never put that hair band thing in her hair. what ever that thing is? i let her choose. and when she was ready i let her be girlie.
she is coming out of it more now, she likes to wear blue and she loves bugs and sports. but she still dances around the yard with scarfs in her hair. and her favorite color is pink.
the best part of this story is mac, he on the other hand loves to dress up in sophies' dresses and put hair bands in his hair and he loves lip gloss. and pink toe nail polish. i guess times will only tell for both of them and what sort of gender roles they will adopt.

crafty chica

there is an actual web-site with this exact name. i really wish i could of got it first. but it's not a bad web-site. they just posted there products will be at michaels. the only place i could consider a church. i worship glue and paint. i am a slave to crafts. i dream of how i can make my living space function more smoothly and more creatively every day. you could call me obsessed? ask around. i have reconfigured my furniture in the last year maybe 25 times. and my house is 930 sq feet. i can not figure out why i am obsessed with rearranging so much. poor pat.
http://craftychica.com/welcome.html

my city

for the first time in my life
i LOVE my town.
don't get me wrong, berkeley was a great place to grow up. and i don't regret ever living there. or for not moving away sooner. also i met my true love there and had both my babies. sometimes i feel like i grew up somewhere i could never go back. too expensive. too crowded. too much concrete! did i mention too many cars?
corvallis is the town for me. i am convinced! we are going to buy a home very soon and finally lay down our roots.
this town has it all. it's affordable, way many parks, bike trails everywhere, great folks and neighbors. flowers everywhere! great schools. absolutely beautiful country side. rolling green hills. oh and not as many cars.
and festivals like every month! people seem to love it here. generally and for real happy. simple.