Thursday, April 30, 2009

Another new fav blog covering H1N1

Science Insider

PSA

Today, I had a mammogram. I had that BIG birthday in February and finally had time to schedule the appointment. The center where I go has a whole Breast Health Center in it. It was lovely. It was new. My mammogram was performed by a cute pregnant woman. It's kind of reassuring to have a pregnant woman giving you a mammogram--you know the radiation dosage must be low when a pregnant woman is in the room!

At the end of all the smushing, she asked, "Would you like to wait for your results? It'll be about 25 minutes." I said, "Sure." I had an article to read and I'm really glad I did wait. Apparently, on one of the images they saw something and needed me to go back in and get smushed again and take another look. Since I waited, they could just grab me and do the additional pictures and tell me that everything looked fine within about 10 minutes. If I would have left, I would have had to have 1) scheduled, 2) gone back for more pictures and 3) waited around again. Can you imagine the anxiety?

I <3 the Breast Health Center at the Medical Group.

It's official

MWH is the only person left on the face of the earth who is not a member of facebook. That's okay. I don't mind (stoic pose).

I <3 zumba. We knew that. I am so sore. This week has been a tough workout week.

I've been very busy googling about the swine flu. I find flu, disease, and germs fascinating. They creep me out and I get obsessed.

The first web site I look at in the morning is CDC. The last one I visit at night is also CDC. Plus a few times during the day. I think I understand why the alert from the CDC is so high so that in case the flu gets worse, we'll have the funding and the vaccination in place. We just don't know what's going to happen. One of my new favorite blogs is Effect Measure. Nice writing on the swine flu subject. I keep almost typing flwine. Maybe we can shorten swine flu to that.

Maybe I should take a moment to think about the diseases/disorders that have captured my interest over the years.

1) gangrene (discussed it a great deal in a report I did on a war)
2) botulism (did a report on it in middle school)
3) ebola (loved hot zone and the other book...)
4) totally freaked out about anthrax, but couldn't think about it because I was pregnant
5) hanta virus
6) chicken pox (I've never had it)
7) Transverse Myelitis
8) Cystic Fibrosis (I worked with some children who had it)
9) Kidney Failure
10) West Nile Virus
11) SARS (but not as much as the others)
12) Infertility

Last night, another blogger pointed me to Bubonic Plague resources, but I'm not even going to link because it freaked me out a little. We can't forget Migraines....

Okay... I should get back to work, eh?

Wednesday, April 29, 2009

bloggy goodness

Where did the bloggy goodness go? I don't know. I'm just TIRED. I'll come back at some point and blog lots.

I want to write about:

1) pathways aka change is hard
2) swine flu
3) what Three-a told me she'll have and do when she grows up

In the mean time, I'll leave you with a snippet of dinner conversation from last night.

I was playing "take Three-a's nose" at dinner... You know, you pretend to grab the kid's nose by sticking your thumb between your first and second finger as you touch their nose and you say "Got your nose!" Then you pretend to eat it. Three-a was laughing but twoK said, "If you really ate her nose, you'd be eating boogers." I laughed. twoK is very smart.

I'm going to sleep.

Monday, April 27, 2009

a good tired

I got to go to Zumba today! It's a class I don't normally get to go to, because it's at a gym where I'm not a member, but there was a special reason, so!

woo!

I am very sore now. It was a killer class.

My house is still messy, but MWH started in on the bathroom floor. I need to get motivated, but perhaps tomorrow. In cleaning news, my car is much cleaner! I vacuumed it out and got all much of the uggy stuff that little girls leave behind when they eat/drink/drag dirt and flowers in the car.

I had no nanny today because n3nny was sick. I am thankful she was sick this week and not last week. (Last week was that project hell!)

I'm kind of wiped from Zumba.

Sunday, April 26, 2009

Sunday

1. My house needs to be cleaned from Top-to-Bottom. I have no desire to do it. I am sure that within the next couple of weeks, I will get most of it cleaned, but this thought completely overwhelms me. I want to start with our bathroom floor. Ugh. Or maybe the kitchen floor. Less ugh.

2. We will hopefully get dressed and walk over to see this little farm close to our house. It's super fun in spring. You have to get there before 1:30 though to see the baby animals. This will be a challenge.

3. The whole family slept in until the 9 o'clock hour. Then the little girls came up and snuggled in bed with us and watched a tv show. It is rare that a) we all sleep in and b) we don't have to leap out of bed and get somewhere. It was nice!

4. I'll come back to Ultimate Fitness later.*

5. I"m not thinking about the loft and organizing it yet. We've started, but we have so much stuff. Part of the stuff up there are materials from grad school. I have my dissertation readings, materials from the research with data, and a lot of the initial writing I did on it in a box. How does one toss their "Dissertation in a box?" I can't. Maybe a better person could.

The dissertation represents a good year of my life and the culmination of six years of hard work. It was only the beginning. Now, 12 years post-doctoral degree, I feel like I kind of know something. It's so exciting because the field** I am in has made a little bit of progress in the last 12 years. If you go back 20 years to when I started, it does seem more advanced. Exciting.



*Assuming some other crazy thing doesn't occur in my life to distract me.

**It's hard to know exactly what "my field" is. I feel I sit at the crossroads of 4 disciplines (T, E, D, P).

Saturday, April 25, 2009

out of habit

When you get in a habit of doing something, it's easy. I feel out of the routine of blogging though. I've been in and out lately because of work, and right now, I feel so far behind I don't know how to catch up. I started writing a post this morning about all the things on my list of things but then I didn't finish. Maybe I'll start slow and try to just get something down....

I know, I'll start talking about the book I'm reading... Ultimate Fitness by Gina Kolata. (You just gotta love her name!) The book reviews a history of fitness, takes on some "myths" and tries to understand things like "the fat burning zone." Okay... I'm posting this now and I'll hopefully get back to it soon. It's time to get the little girls in bed.

Friday, April 24, 2009

it's a wrap!

The new project is wrapped up and sent off today. Finally.

More soon.

After I have 6 kids in my house for 3 hours tonight.

Yea, I am insane.

Must remember...

To apply sunscreen to my neck...My hair is rather short in the back now. MWH would suggest that I just grow it out again and save the time it would take to smear sunscreen on my neck. (It's not that short in the front (cut shorter in the back than front).)


I should probably remember to dust my mirror too, eh?

Wednesday, April 22, 2009

algebra

I must write this down before I forget. MWH told me about how he was doing algebra in his head while in our aerobics class.

Yes, that's my boy! I heart him!

The answer to the problem was 2014.

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

Yum! The cereal version.



MWH found the chocolate one and I found the PB one. He asked what would happen if I got the PB granola in his chocolate granola or he got the chocolate one in my PB Granola. (Note, this is a reference to this. Any one remember it?) (I love the web... I can find 70s commercials in seconds. Such a good use of technology!)

Anyway, we mixed, and indeed, it is yummy. There you go.

Sunday, April 19, 2009

Yesterday

(The post starts boring and then gets more exciting.)

I worked a little. I needed to do more, but I didn't have *anything* left. 1) The heat got to me. It's warming up this weekend, but only for a few days (thankfully). The first few times it gets warm, it really sucks for me. 2) I needed to step away a little from the writing to gain some perspective. On Thursday night, I could barely string words together. It was BAD. Friday morning was a little better, but having taken most of Friday off and most of Saturday, I feel refreshed and like I can think again.


A funny thing, yesterday, twoK came upstairs with a helmet, handed it to Three-a and said, "Here's your space helmet so we can go to outer space T___."

oNe was right there and discussing space travel too. Then oNe made an oxygen tank (out of paper and string) so they would be good on their trip.

MWH was falling down because of the cuteness. He was almost ready to go "try again for another one" because they were so cute. (He likes the idea of space travel a LOT.) You KNOW it was cute because it was the only time I've ever seen MWH think that having another child would even be slightly a good idea. He wasn't serious.

(Don't any one start thinking there might be more children because we really aren't interested. Three little girls are lots of fun. I really like 3! If we had more, I'd have to change the blog name, and I like the blog name. I also like the NEW blog name I have picked for when I am sick of this blog name and it keeps the three-theme going. No permanent, irreversible measures have been taken to insure no more children, but there is one very, very reliable method firmly installed in my uterus. It's not coming out either. I'll probably get 1-2 more of those devices before my doctor says they won't be necessary any more.)

Oh, but we could speak about more children for one of my friends. She's adopting! Woo! She just got word that it's all happening and .... well, I don't know all of the adoption terms, but she's got the information here. I know she's shouting from the rooftops about the new little one so she'll be happy if you want to go read about it all!

What else.... I think that's it for now. It's not hot here yet, but I'm bracing myself. It's supposed to be 10 degrees warmer today than it was yesterday. We plan to head to the YMCA and swim later today. Must go make some coffee now.

Saturday, April 18, 2009

Whooooooosh

That was this week. It was busy.

I wrote lots. I worked lots.

I have a new favorite song, but I'll tell you about that later. If you know me in real life or facebook (or both) you'll probably have heard/read about it.

I am exhausted.

Since it was spring break, yesterday, MWH and I took the day off and took the girls to a local amusement park for little kids. It was super fun. The thing that appealed to the bargain-hunter in me was that the tickets we were regular admission price (read expensive) but were tied to a promotional deal. The deal means we can get in the whole season with them and not pay any more admission! Woo! I doubt we'll have time to go more than once or twice more, but still, it's nice to have two or three visits for the price of one! (It'll be free, except for the parking and their over-priced, unhealthy food. Ugh. The food. Just ugh.)

In addition to the work, the local amusement park also made me exhausted. I don't like being in the sun or heat. I'm going to buy a nice little sun hat I've decided. A straw kind of one with lots of air circulation at the top and a fairly big brim. And yes, I will be getting wet with the girls in the water splash area.

One other super great thing about this little amusement park is that kids over 36 inches tall can often go on rides by themselves! I like a good roller coaster, but I don't like the spin-y rides. If we didn't have at least two children, I wouldn't send them alone, but since there are three of them, they can go together and MWH and I can stand and watch. Or sit in the shade and watch.




Here's a picture of MWH and the girls on the Ferris Wheel. (Heh.) Must get back to work now.

Thursday, April 16, 2009

whoops!

My jaw is where my stress goes. I clench tightly.

I have a night guard. It helps protect my teeth, and when I'm really stressed, I even wear it during the day. One of my friends shakes her head and says, "I don't know HOW you wear that thing, especially during the day!" Most people, so my dentist tells me, don't like their night guards, but I LOVE MINE. (Another friend confirms that she hates hers and usually finds she's taken it out in the middle of the night and thrown it across the room. Hrm.)

Anyway, this crazy project I took on at work, um, it caused some stress. The last few months, I've been working steadily and not too crazily--well, except for that paper I had to get done more quickly than I wanted, but it wasn't too bad.

Over all, my jaw felt better. Not 100%, but not too bad. But now this project, my jaw HURTS. Pretty much within 2 days of working on this project it hurt as bad as it did when I was under tremendous stress before. And! Bonus! Now, I have some numbness in my left cheek. I'm sure this is stress related from all the clenching. Whoops.

I will see if it resolves in a few days after the craziness has subsided. I've done a lot of work in the last few days and got the ball rolling and now, it's off to another organization so I might be nearly done.

It's good to be almost done. I really do feel the effects of crazy stress. I'm exhausted and the numbness (residual from the TM) I have is significantly worse right now. I like doing these kinds of projects, but I know the insane-ness of them IS NOT good for me. (It's not good for any one.) Okay... I won't say yes to anything insanely crazy for a while again.

Wednesday, April 15, 2009

just to confirm...

My jaw is DEFINITELY more sore when I'm stressed. (Like we had any doubt before.)

Tuesday, April 14, 2009

So far behind...

In documenting our lives that I don't actually know where to start.

1. Easter.

2. My Bro.

3. The wedding.

4. Upcoming trips.

5. oNe has lost another toot.

6. MWH blogged!

7. Chicken Pox Watch.

8. People who yell at work.

9. Super Memory Chick and my thoughts on that related to blogging.

10. Insane but lovin' it right now at work.

I will post more (if time allows) about these things.

Monday, April 13, 2009

Because...

Because I'm writing and need to stay focused, I give you Doga. I know nothing about it, other than what this blog tells us. I kinda laughed when I read the blog so I thought I'd share.

And now back to writing a very complex argument for why we should get money to do some research that is STEP 1 in a series of steps. (I think I am good at writing Step 1. I don't necessarily know what Step 2 is, but I do know what Step 1 should be, and that is what science is all about... Understanding what we have so we can then improve upon it and go further. I'll write about Step 2 after I fully understand Step 1.)

A fun site

Showing some geek. I can't wait for oNe to play!

Saturday, April 11, 2009

A change

I just started publishing full feeds from this blog. I know that many folks are toying around with full feeds or not, and I resisted because I like to know how much traffic I'm getting. It's only for my own edification that I like to know how much traffic I'm getting. Since I try to stay anonymous, I don't want to be read by *that* many people.

For those of you who read me regularly and leave comments now and then, I lurve you! Please keep reading and commenting. I have definitely enjoyed getting to know you. I hope we continue to get to hang out for years and years. I'm a long-term kind of commitment girl.

My wonderful bloggy friend Nino asked if I could turn on full feed and I thought about it and said, No because of monitoring web traffic, but then I thought about it some more and realized it's more fun if people do read, so why not make it easier for them?

So, voila, full feeds for you in your blog reader of choice. If you wouldn't mind doing me a favor, it would be SUPER...Please tell me which reader you use if it's not Google Reader or Bloglines.

xoxo to you all.

When they get noisy...

Sometimes, the three little girls can get very noisy. When this occurs, and I can't take it any more, I tell them, if you can stay quiet for five-minutes, I will give you a nickel. Then I set the timer on the microwave (or iPhone, whichever is handier). It works. It only costs me 15 cents if they all make it, and the silence is worth every penny. This morning, I introduced the girls to the phrase, "double or nothing." We played for 10 minutes. It cost a bit more, but it was worth it.

Thursday, April 09, 2009

You would THINK I was smart enough to learn from past experiences...

But, no, I'm not.

I signed up, voluntarily, to do ABSOLUTELY INSANE thing at work by next week. The good news is that the insanity is short lived. The bad news is that I'm gonna be INSANE for a week. I'll update as I can.

An unrelated piece of good news is that I get to go to a very fun, but totally intense workout class with my Zumba teacher!!! I am so excited. If I have enough energy to type after the crazy 1.5 hour workout tomorrow, I'll update you!

Tuesday, April 07, 2009

So?

What do you guys think? New picture? New colors? Feedback, please!

Monday, April 06, 2009

Hold on tight...

Here we go!

I am writing a very brief thing for work by the end of this week.... I may be signing up to do a much more extensive effort by 4/24. We'll make the decision tomorrow morning. Yikes. In the meantime, I'm going to need to sleep. I have this weird headache/dizzy thing going on right now.



Completely random stuff.
1. My friend has a three-year-old and she doesn't EVER get to talk on the phone because her child is an absolute MENACE when she's on the phone. Yea, yea, I know it's common for kids not to want their Mom to pay attention to something other than their loveliness, but I think that child needs some, um, discipline.

2. Another friend is gaining weight. I don't think she's pregnant. I saw her today for the first time in a couple of weeks and wow, a great deal of weight has been gained. Maybe she is pregnant. Then it would be fine. Or maybe, her top just wasn't flattering. I've never seen the show, "What not to wear" but that phrase kept popping into mind.

3. I keep FORGETTING what I'm doing. I'm starting to carry a sticky pad around with me because, seriously, I can't remember things for 2 minutes. I am starting to worry about me. (And today's head thing really isn't helping my level of concern.)

Spring Break

It's spring break next week. That I'm thinking about it this far in advance is kind of amazing.

A couple of weeks ago, I was thinking about it and looked at flight prices to a location that is close by and has lots of fun kids stuff. MWH and I don't like to travel so we opted to think about the trip some more before buying the tickets.

I looked today, and the prices are 40-120 more per flight. It wouldn't be so bad, but times 5 makes even 40 more a ticket a lot. The price increase is making the decision for us to not go. (We are both secretly, or not so secretly, relieved.)

Now, I think we're thinking of having mostly a normal week and then taking Friday off and hanging and doing something fun with the girls. I just need to figure out what local thing we want to do. There are lots, but which one? We could just do something very local and sleep at home, or we could drive a little further and spend the night somewhere. Hrm. I'm guessing we'll end up doing something very local.

I don't know what kind of tree it is

but the flowers sure are pretty.

Saturday, April 04, 2009

New BFF?

Okay, actually two potential new BFFs!

1. This Mom in oNe's classroom, she's young, and she told me she thought I was younger than her. I lurve her.

2. This other Mom in oNe's classroom... She loves my new facebook picture. She said, "I couldn't stop looking at it. I wanted to frame it as art." I lurve her too.

Saturday

Today, we got up and took the girls to a birthday party at 10 in the morning. It was early, but it worked great. It was at a pizza place, you know, the one with the oversized rodent, and the place was empty. If we ever wake up early on a weekend day, we'll go back there and let the girls play. By noon, it was getting crowded.

I'm going in about 10 different directions emotionally, today. First, I felt all silly today. I'm not sure why. Then, I go to get coffee at a place I never go, and I'm looking forward to the coffee, but as I drive in the parking lot, I get hit in the chest with sadness. I believe the last time I was at that coffee place, I met my friend who died. Sigh.

Oh, speaking of death, my Mom's best childhood friend died recently. It was fairly sudden. The woman was 86-ish, so not completely unexpected, but it hit my Mom kind of hard. I guess it's good Dad had a longer-ish demise for my Mom's sake.

Okay, despite the fact that this post has become macabre, I am in a good mood. Next up with the girls, the park!

good problem

I found some jeans I liked over Christmas break. I bought them. When I saw my wonderful friend in January, she told me they were too big for me. She was right.

I went back and bought them in the next size smaller. They fit great for a while (couple months), but now, they are falling down. I thank Zumba and my wonderful Zumba teacher for this terrific problem. Yes, I work hard, but my Zumba teacher makes it easy for me to work hard because the class is so much fun. I've only lost about 1-2 pounds since Christmas, but apparently, I am still toning up.


Now, I just have to find time to go shopping. I <3 Zumba!!

Friday, April 03, 2009

Green cat



I am not artistic in any way shape or form, but I made this little guy and thought he was cute! I made it back in 2004 right before twoK was born. He was smushed back into the play-doh can shortly after. It's okay. I'm over it.

Here's some cat news, MWH's cat woke us up early this morning and we were annoyed.

Thursday, April 02, 2009

just for the record...

Alfr2d needs a new battery. I first wrote about him here, but we got him about a year ago.

I totally <3 Alfr2d and may Alfred RIP. (We gave Alfred away to someone to see if he could get fixed, but I never heard back from the guy who took him so I don't know what happened... maybe Alfred is working happily again.)

Stronger?

What does not kill me, makes me stronger. Nietzsche*

1. I survived my paper. I am still working on it, but the worst is over.

2. Zumba is getting easier. I'm thinking I would like to add another workout class each week... I STILL need to do weights. I do a little, but I need to do more.

3. I remember, when we did our insane project proposal last year. After it, I felt stronger.

4. Now that the girls are a little older, I feel stronger.


In other news....Today is Autism awareness day... (thanks to Nino for this info! Go learn some more about autism.)

More soon.




*For a long time, I thought Nietzsche was kind of evil, but I don't think so now, and he did inspire some of the minds I greatly admire. Any thoughts on Nietzsche out there?