I had a little time to myself this afternoon, and I spent it visiting blogs. I have a short list of blogs that I follow, and I still have time getting to them all regularly. So, it was a pleasure today to check in with everybody, to see how you all are.
Dr. D…..Happy Birthday late, hon. I’m glad to read that your roof held despite all that Ivan threw at you.
WichiDude….Coongratulations on a year of blogging. I thought you had started blogging before I did, so I was surprised to see it was your blog anniversary. Keep up the good work.
Blue Witch has been adding to her foul…er fowl collection. Go see the pictures.
Jamie was sending shouts to missing friends (me included), and they’ve celebrated Q16’s birthday.
Desiree has interviewed for a job, and they are going to sell their house and move.
Bogie and WS are back from a trip to Niagara Falls, and she’s more than busy pet sitting.
PJ has been out living life and painting bedrooms. He’s working on starting a paintball business, but found the time to blog and let us know he’s among the living.
Broad at Bat is making lists, and saving them, and remaking them, and saving them…..
billy is off on a road trip, or will be soon.
RedEagle1 ( who hosts my blog ) is the mom of three boys, and her middle son just learned to water ski!
Legomen IS…..off drinking.
Essay, at Stupid Angry Canajun, has been goaded into recycling newspapers, and is caring for a multitude of creatures while her significant other is away for the weekend. Go give her advice! lol
-=e=- has a DREADFUL post on self dentistry….
Mad Bull and his folk came through the hurricane okay, and kept us posted on Dr. D.
Ms. Roberta has suggested that some of us may need an amnesia pill. to forget political goings on.
Jim at Parkway Rest Stop linked up to a site with complaints about New Jersey tollway collectors that was eye opening.
I still have a few more of you to visit, but I want to thank you all for continuing to visit, even though I have occasionally come up missing this summer. It’s nice to have a feeling of connection.

The City of Chicago has amost 2000 surveillance cameras, and will be adding another 250 by 2006. The cameras are currently set up at O’Hare International Airport, in public housing overseen by the Chicago Housing Authority, on the city transit lines, in parks, and in schools. These cameras will be tied into the 911 center.
The cameras will be checking for bags abandonded in stairwells, for movement in areas off limits to citizens, for a person falling, and for erratic behavior, among other things.
Mayor Daley was quoted as saying “We own the sidewalk. We own the street and we own the alley.” Since these cameras are only in public areas, according to Daley, there will be no invasion of privacy.
In designing the system, representatives studied how the casinos and hotels in Las Vegas used their surveillance cameras. The Pentagon, and London have similar systems. When cameras were installed on the streets of the west side of Chicago last year, drug trafficing cut back, and there were fewer calls to report the sale of drugs on the street.
I’m torn. I can see both sides of this issue. As a law abiding citizen, I don’t mind being watched in a public place. If this were to give law enforcement a leg up on detering the incredible incidence of crime, and it seems to function that way, it should be a good thing.
But…..I worry that this could be the start of the slippery slope. If we are observed as we walk to work, or as we drive past certain intersections, will someone eventually create software that will track our activities? I know that it’s possible for lawyers to petition the tollway for records showing that someone has used the IPass on a certain day, at a certain time, so we can’t be far from it.
How do you feel about it? Give up a little freedom to cut back on potential terrorism and make our streets safer? Or….no cameras….no loss of freedom, but greater risk?

I’m one of those rare women. I really don’t care to shop. Well…..I don’t care to shop for anything other than quilt fabric. But, today was a day of errands and shopping.
Dear Husband is trying to get in all the sailing he can before the ARR!! is brought in for the winter. We know that it will be craned out October 9th, so there isn’t a lot of time left, just a few weekends, really. We went out to breakfast early, and then he drove to Lake Michigan, and I went to the Farmer’s Market.
I picked up veggies to get us through the next four or five days, and six bright sunflowers. I stopped at the bee keeper’s stand, and bought some almond flavored lip balm, and two body bars. A few booths down, I picked up two more cedar planks for grilling salmon. Peaches from SW Michigan, and mini portobellos, and I was loaded down. I hate to have to make two trips, so I called it quits and headed home, filling the gas tank and stopping at the ATM on the way.
Mother was scheduled for a perm. We decided to make a stop at the quilt shop, on the way to the salon. I needed fabric for backing and borders on the batik quilt, and some fabric to make a pink and white quilt for one of my nieces. Mother bought a wild velour for a robe, and material for a 1930’s reproduction quilt. WOW! Has quilting fabric gotten expensive!
So…I dropped Mother off for her perm, and then started my errands:
Bath and Body Shop for shower gel (I’ll be smelling like a peony for a bit.)
Michaels’s (OOOPS….gone out of business sale….nothing left but fixtures!)
Hobby Lobby (Silk flowers for a wreath, candles)
Car wash (Car wash….what else??)
Meat Market (Pork roast, flank steak, cordon bleu chicken)
For a woman who doesn’t care to shop….that was more than enough. I still have most of it to put away. It was a great day. I’ve got enough fabric to hold me for a day or two, I can finish the Fall wreaths, and I’ll smell pretty when I shower. What more can I ask?

….seems to have gone on a walk-about of his own.
We have this deal. He gets to go out as early in the morning as he can con someone into opening the door. He comes back for breakfast anytime from ten minutes later to 9:00 a.m. From then on, he’s in and out like a yo-yo. And close to 2:00 in the afternoon, he’s in for the day.
This hasn’t seemed to be a hardship on him, particularly as he’s aged. He’s gotten to like the comfort of a snooze in the sunlight, where he didn’t have to worry about enemies or predators sneaking up on him. He’s taken over my chair, and wants to take over the table where my computer sits.
So, today, we had errands to run. The cat (Ed, is his name, after Edwin Scissorhands), went out early, and has not been seen since. We’ve called him every 10 or 15 minutes for the past few hours….and NO CAT!
Now, every other time this has happened, it’s been a glorious day (like today). He never disappears in the middle of a snow storm, or when we’re getting 17 inches of rain. I shouldn’t be worried, but I am. I can’t help wondering if he’s been hurt or run over.
He’s probably adopted a second family…..one who has a better brand of cat food. Or maybe there’s a pretty little lady cat down the path…….
Darn cat! I wonder where he is!
UPDATE: He’s home. He was gone long enough to scare me, but when I walked out at 9:00 to call him, he came running to me as though nothing had happened. Darn cat!

Or, rather……rideabout. At 87, my mother finds traveling through the farmland in the Fall to be very satisfying. She is tired of seeing the constant upheaval from construction in our area, and complains that every inch of the world will be blacktopped over in her lifetime.
So, at least once a year, and sometimes more frequently, we load ourselves into the car and take off on a trip. Yesterday’s trip was a bit longer than she had expected, but we came home wit a vehicle so full that we couldn’t have stopped at one more shop.
We took off west out of the Chicago suburbs and when we hit the farmland, we turned south. Our first stop was at a huge farm discount store, to buy birdseed. We crossed over the Kankakee river and traveled a little further south before turning east.
One of her grand daughters lives in the area we were visiting, so we made a stop. I had a plate of Chocolate Almond cupcakes with fudge frosting to drop off, and we wanted to visit Granddaughter’s shop. She has wonderful country items, and she creates clothing and housewares with applique. We tried to buy her out, but she had a couple of thing left by the time I pulled Mother out the door.
On their recommendation, we had lunch at “The Polka Dot Diner.” It’s a fast food place that has both a drive up and interior seating, and the theme is 50s and 60s TV and movie memorabilia. Mother thought she was ordering a club sandwich, and ended up with a burger with bacon, lettuce, tomato, and mayo. They were forgiven, when she pronounced the onion rings were excellent!
We were surrounded by James Dean, Beaver Cleaver, Rickie Nelson, Superman, Elvis, and a horde of other personalities.
Our next stop was a Ben Franklin store. We used to call them “five and dimes,” meaning that the items cost a nickle or a dime, but in times of gross inflation, that term no longer exists, and unfortunately, most of the Ben Franklin stores have disappeared too. I shopped for Halloweeen decorations, and Mother bought two red hats, seven yards of blue plaid flannel, and three huge pots of chrysanthemums.
She was flagging at that point, so we loaded our finds into the car, and headed home. My car made one brief detour. All on it’s very own, it turned into the parking lot of a quilt shop I had never visited. Since we were there, I HAD to go in, but it was a sign of how tired she was, that Mother chose to stay in the car. I made my stop very brief, and we finished our “walkabout,” driving home amid thousands of cars all seemingly headed to our house.
It was a really pleasant day. I’d like to do a couple of shorter versions of that trip for her, and we’ll do at least one, possibly two longer trips before winter closes in. We have a weekend trip to visit my youngest sister and her family in October, and I’m contemplating a trip up into Wisconsin to a town that has THREE quilt shops. Sounds like heaven to me…..farmland and quilt shops!

Isn’t science amazing!? There isn’t a day that goes by where I don’t read something new, from black holes and charming quarks, to astonishing information about how our body works, headlines on cloning, and new information on disease prevention.
We live in an amazing time. My grandfather had one foot in the horse and buggy era and the other planted firmly at a time when men rode rockets to orbit the earth. I can not remember a time when my family didn’t have both television and radio bringing information into the house.
So, you can imagine my amazement at the latest breakthrough in technology. I was grocery shopping. I picked up carton of eggs, and lifted the lid to make sure none of them was cracked. On each egg was a line of red print saying “Use By Sept. 24.”
That’s just incredible! Scientists have tinkered with hens and found a way to get them to print out freshness dates when they lay eggs. They must be using nanotechnology to line the pigment up in the shell, but I can’t figure out how they change the date. I guess I’ll have to do some surfing. Maybe they have engineered it so that chickens have a computer chip passed on to them when they are just a yolk.
I bet the chickens are strutting around thinking, “It’s Tuesday. We get extra grain on Tuesday.” Or, “Four more weeks, and they’ll let me out into the yard!”
I wonder if they try to warn the turkeys when Thanksgiving is coming, or if they keep it to themselves.
It’s a great invention. Now we’ll never have another stale egg again.

I don’t care for the term EX-husband. I have one of them, and I prefer to refer to him as my “former” husband. I guess that makes DH the “latter’ husband. I supposed I could call Mr. Former “the JERK,” but I’ve tried to play nice in public.
Anyway, today I was thinking about the fact that I have EX-relatives. My brother and his FORMER wife divorced, and it put me in a difficult position. I like the woman he was married to, the mother of his children, and I like the woman he IS married to. It’s very difficult to know just what to do about it.
I tried to keep in touch with his former wife, and found that was uncomfortable. I wondered if she felt I was a reminder of all that had happened, and it occured to me that perhaps I was hurting her by keeping in touch.
And, my present sister-in-law may see my relationship to the former Mrs. as being a slap in the face.
What to do….what to do? Are we supposed to close ranks and support our siblings, no matter what they do? Does that mean we cease recognizing the parent of our nieces and nephews?
I wonder if Emily Post has written about this. Perhaps I need to surf on “Divorce Manners.”
I have to admit, when my former husband kept in touch with one of my sisters, it really ticked me off at first. Then I realized it was probably a good idea to have a conduit, and I worked at letting the matter drop. I wonder if I put my siblings in the same position I’m in now?
Duh….
Never let it be said that I think on my feet….

We FINALLY got some rain! We’ve had gray days off and on for the past month, interspersed with gorgeous sunny ones, and NO RAIN! We got the gray skies, but all the storms have gone north or south of us.
So, last night about 2:00 there was a great crashing and flashing around us, and there be rain! We needed it. I’ve been putting down mulch, and I had to water first because the ground was drying up.
I’ll have to walk the grounds to see if we lost any trees last night. The storm came through fairly fast and furious.
And, in the dark, my first thought was..”I need to check on Defer.” Of course, he’s gone, but for the last fifteen years I had a dog who hid from lightening. His favorite place as a pup was under my computer desk, and in his later years, he chose our bedroom. I’m glad he’s spared the storms now.
So….this weekend….more mulching! I know that most of you consider that drudgery…but I’ll take it over sailing any day! *G*

My mother is a member of the Empty Nesters group at her church. They are collecting items to send to our troops, and I wanted to share the list of items with you. It’s amazing what little things can help make their stay more comfortable.
I need your help. I’d like to find sources who might be willing to donate some of these items, but I’m a total rooky at this. Are there stores who do NOT donate, and are there stores who would be likely to donate? Should I contact manufacturers rather than going to retail stores? What do I need to have with me, other than the list of goods needed, to make my pitch successful? I assume that I need to provide the name and address of the church, and a contact. What else should I provide to make my request a success?
I’d appreciate any assistance you can give me. This is a worthy cause.

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Perhaps you call it “dinner.” I know there are regional differences in naming this meal, but I’m talking about the meal that is served at the end of the working day.
When I was a kid, it was possible for us all to gather for dinner at 5:30. Wednesday night church choir practice, or weeknight activities at school like band or play practice, football games, or dances all were scheduled late enough that you could have dinner with your family and then head off to evening activities.
We timed our clocks by Dad’s return home, and knew how much time we had left until we were expected at the table. We had a formal dining room, and also a more casual kitchen table. On Sunday afternoon at 2:00 we always ate in the dining room. Breakfast, lunch and Saturday meals were usually in the kitchen. As my youngest sister grew, we ate in the dining room more and more.
We were not assigned seats at the table, but we always took the same seats. My Dad sat at the head of the table and Mother sat to his left. My brother, the only lefty, sat at the end of the table where his elbow wouldn’t bother anyone. Dad served the meat and passed the plate to my mother, who added vegetables.
I think my brother might have been served first, because I’ve heard it said that my father rarely got to eat his own meal before my brother was ready for seconds. I don’t know how much of that is the truth, but he WAS a growing boy. *G*
Dinner was the only time during the day that our family came together. There’s a range of 19 years between my oldest sister and my youngest, so there were quite a variety of schedules to organize to accomplish that, but it was assumed that you would be at the table. We talked about what had happened during our day, and discussed the plans for the weekend.
This is on my mind lately because we have slipped into more casual dining. Frequently, I prepare a meal, everyone comes together to fill their plate, and then we all drift off to our own corners. We watch evening news or read books during the dinner hour, and there’s no time for conversation.
One of my nieces is a single mother of two boys. They live within ten minutes of us, and one day I suggested that she and the boys should come to dinner. It became a standing invitation. When Tuesday rolls around, she calls to make sure we are “on” for the night, and arranges to bring a dessert.
While we are at the table, we talk about what’s happened in our day. We encourage the boys to talk, and their mother prompts them to use “good” manners. The boys carry food to the table, and their mother occasionally helps with last minute food preparation. The boys get to see Dear Husband and me work together, and they get to know one of DH’s sons. AND, they get to interact with their great grandmother.
When dinner is over, we get out the UNO cards and play three very fast and dirty hands of UNO. My mother takes no prisoners when playing cards, and always sits next to the older of the two boys. He is resigned to being handed every draw two, and draw four in the deck, and takes it with good grace. He’s delighted when he has the chance to give back as good as he gets.
The sense of community that we have as a result of our time together is what dinner should be about. I want those boys to know us. I want them to see the give and take in adult relationships, and I want them to see that it’s possible to have a pleasant time without resorting to TV or game boys.
I know that this family dinner is good for my mother, as well. At 87, she needs the contact with her family, too. So…..how is it that we have slipped away from the practice? Now that we don’t have young ones in our midst, we seem to have lost track of the fact that everyone needs interraction. Perhaps we drifted away from the table to save me having more linens to wash…..or to save the extra dishes that had to be cleaned. Or maybe there was something special on TV that drew us, to start.
This is just one person’s view, but I think we need to re-establish the old-fashioned dinner hour. We need a place where we can talk about what has happened during the day, to congratulate family members on their successes, and to help them when a problem arises. It’s a great place to teach a kid civics or charitable activities. And it’s a good way to keep up with what’s happening in your children’s lives.
It’s time to return to the table for supper.