Grreat!

Tony should be shaking his fist.

Grr is for Grray, Grrandma, & Grrief! Apparently even Seattle isn't natural enough to appreciate that people under 60 years of age might have gray hair.


Grrief, this is what people are giving me. I paid a visit to the northwest to see my sister Maria who just had her first baby. On two out of three days I was accused of being the baby's grandmother! Grrandmother??


The first incident was a random lady in a parking lot. She looked at the baby, then at me and said, "That's a tiny one, grandma." I was thinking what a weirdo she was for talking to herself in the third person when I realized she was referring to me. I was so perplexed, distraught etc. I had to eat $15 worth of salad.


The second was a carpool mom whom Maria had just told, "I'm taking my sister to the airport." Next thing I know, this person is asking if Hugo's my first grandchild. Uh no, I'm Maria's sister.

I admit that yes, I am old enought to be Hugo's grandmother. But Maria's mother? She is six years younger than I! Grr is for curses on all of them! Both my accusers, I might add, had gray hair themselves-one abundantly so.


Maybe instead of SoJ I should be called SoGray. I will not color my hair.

The Yard's never looked better.

Whoops, I meant for theses to be at the end.

This is girls' camp, fabulous piece of property that.

Nice warning.

Princess bandaids.

Mmm, fabulous food in my yard.

Ah, here's the yard.

So fun to run barefoot in the grass.

The most recent bird's buried under that tree.


The yard now looks like a herd of cattle passed through, I'm done with it. Bring on the snow.

Yard Trauma--The continuing story.

I love this stuff. Need I say more?

Had more bird trauma but refrained from taking pictures because it was gruesome. I was watering my flowers and noticed a bunch of bird feathers. I looked around the corner and there was a mangled, decapitated bird with a big old puncture wound through its chest. That bird had not been there 30 minutes before.

In the time it took me to jog around the neighborhood someone's pet--going out on a limb here and saying "dog" due to the size of the wound and the freshly deposited poop in my yard--trashed the bird, desecrated my back yard, and left. Grr!

Moth Terror

Does this picture not make you shudder?

The other night I started drifting off to sleep before I'd turned out the light. I opened my eyes after however many minutes of those weird half-awake dreams and saw a black thing on the ceiling. At first I thought it was a cockroach and sat bolt upright in bed. Then I realized it was a moth!

Mind you this was during all that rain we had just a week or two ago so all my doors and windows had been closed for days. Where had it been hiding that it suddenly appeared full grown in my bedroom? Germinating in my closet?? Sick!!

I trapped it in my very small bathroom and I had to go in there to try and dispose of it. Horrifying. It took a good fifteen minutes of shrieking and swatting before I was finally successful. Totally overwrought.

The next day I was out working in the yard and I felt a tickle on my leg, I looked down all annoyed and there was a moth crawling on me! I totally screamed and did a freakish little dance trying to get the thing off me. I know the guy who lives behind me totally witnessed everything.

I hate moths.

Vitamin Fortified

A few years ago I saw these E meal things in Walmart and I thought they'd be great for food storage or backpacking. I noticed the expiration date was nearing so I thought I'd open one up and see how it tasted.

I tried the Cheese Spread first, I do like Cheese Whiz after all.

It was good but it had a really vitamin-y aftertaste. Have you ever smelled the vitamin drops for babies? It tasted like that, kind of metallic and yucky.

I looked at the package and noticed it supplied 70% of the RDA of Vit C. Since when does cheese have vitamin C?? And then I noticed Vit A, B etc.

Holy Cow, Fortified Cheese Spread.


What are Osmotic Raisins?


Hard to see them but they were super "moist" (yes, my skin crawls at having to use that word) and shiny.
I'll take the sundried variety, thank you very much.

By the way, I've discovered the key to inspiration for my blog--Avoidance. Yes, anytime I have something else I should be doing ie-working on my paper, cleaning, practicing--I suddenly have a head full of ideas . Classic.

Love the rain, but...

Dead bird in the flower pot!!

It has been raining quite a lot and apparently the storms are causing the death of birds in the vicinity of my house. Could the bird have fallen anywhere besides right into one of the newly planted pots intended for Crystelle's reception?

I had a shriek hovering in the back of my throat before, during and after removal of the bird! The geranium stem was caught in its wing so I couldn't just quickly tip the thing out, I had to extract it. I was completely traumatized.

This is the second dead bird in as many weeks, maybe there's an electric forcefield hovering over my property. I'm sure that's it, or West Nile Virus.

Side note: Apparently my little sojourn in Jordan killed all my opinions, neuroses, hang-ups etc. The proverbial well seems to have run dry! Consternated? Yes. Constipated? Possibly. I'm going to have cut back to weekly posts until I've acquired enough stress to inspire outbursts, it seems. Just a theory.

Jordan Pics part II

This figure represents Palestine--shackled.

I, not realizing how sensitive an issue it is, made a lovely faux pas my first day. Trying to find some common ground I mentioned that I'd visited Jordan once before following a trip to Israel. The lady I was speaking to stopped me and said, "Because we are Muslim and because we are Arabs we say, 'Palestine.'" Oh. Yikes.

They really do always refer to Israel as Palestine. Many of the Jordanians are displaced Palestinians, in fact I'd say the majority of people I talked to were originally from Palestine.

We totally climbed into the diorama thing and posed with the manequin!

Posing in front of the Jordan University Library.



Jordanian student nurses and their clinical instructor, Tagreedh--her name means the sound of birds. Isn't that cool? The meaning of names is really important in Jordan and they'd always ask us what our names meant. Um, nothing?



University hospital.

Tiny nurse.

Ok, everyone posed.

Heads!

Cute Jordanian student nurses.

Our BYU students were like celebrities, random girls would come up and want to have their picture taken with the Americans.

Model pose.

First day of church--black skirt, green top, no surprise.

The church isn't officially recognized so there isn't a real chapel and it can't be called a church, hence, Center for Cultural and Educational Affairs.

Shiny happy people.

Listening very intently during orientation.

Our little undergrads and the PhD students.

Posing with the Ambassador to Jordan, Stephen Beecroft, BYU Alumnus.

Chowing down on yummy food at the Ambassador's.

Posing with Princess Muna, aka "Toni". She's the King's mother but was never queen, although she was married to the former King. They met on the set of Lawrence of Arabia, isn't that funny?

I'm clearly anxious to be part of the picture.

Linger longer.

Feeling chatty on the patio.

Happy at the Ambassador's digs.
Why on earth did we pose around that hideous table?