I hate you. That is all.

Most sincerely,
Monica

...to West Virginia in the morning, that is. The busy work travel season is gearing up again. This is a good thing for me in some ways. I need the time away to have some quiet and recharge so that I am better able to deal with the kids when I am home. I've had very little travel for work over the past few months and I'm starting to feel drained and edgy. I am a little worried about leaving for four days though because Roo has been very clingy lately. Who knows though, maybe it will be a the best way to get her over it.

We decided to participate in a meetup.com walk with a few of the people who are training for the 3-Day Walk in Chicago as we begin to think about preparing our bodies to walk 60 miles in three days in a few months. Given how awful the weather has been lately, it was an absolutely gorgeous morning. Rather than drive down to Waterfront Park and then walk, we opted to start our walk from home. We made the 1.6 miles in about 30 minutes (not too bad considering traffic lights and the icy spots we had to deal with on the sidewalks). We met up with the other folks and began our walk down 3rd St. with the goal of walking until we reached I-264.

We had made it down to UofL's law school when we saw a man and his two large white dogs walking towards us. Now, given that we have two dogs that are possibly Great Pyr mixes and that one of the other couples we were walking with do foster care for a Great Pyr rescue, we all started to wonder if there big white fluffballs could be also be Pyrs. Indeed they were and the man walking with them has been walking for months from Austin, TX on his way to Boston, MA in an effort to raise awareness and money for researching cancer in dogs (www.2dogs2000miles.org). After chatting briefly and finding out that his goal for the day was to walk across the Second St. bridge, we decided to revise our route and turn around to join them on their trek.

We were very glad we did. It turns out that the dog that was the reason for his quest was named Malcolm...so it must have been a sign. :-) We all had a great time chatting and getting to know each other, talking about our fundraising, talking about hiking, talking about pets, and talking about the fight against cancer. The day was very much like taking part in an actual 3-Day Walk, just on a much smaller and cross-species level. We ended up walking about 12 miles for the day and while I'm sure we'll be a bot sore tomorrow it was such a great way to get back into the swing of things with a reminder of why we are doing what we are doing. If we can make a difference in just one life, it is all worth it.

Thank you so much to gypsy1969 , for coming and spending time with E1 and E2 so we could make this journey. Friends like that are priceless and we are so thankful that we have so many people in our lives that we can call on for support.

Just keep walking!

So we decided at the last minute to throw a little party on Christmas Eve since we were going to be going out of town and would be missing all the New Year's festivities here with our friends. There wasn't a huge turn out which was to be expected, but we did have a number of good friends come by to spend the evening with us and we ended up having a wonderful time. Christmas has always been a time pretty much reserved for family for me so having a chance to spend part of it with my some of my dearest friends was really wonderful and has made it very easy to put a real smile on my face this morning in spite of my general dislike of this holiday.

Belief-O-Matic results:

1. Unitarian Universalism (100%)
2. Liberal Quakers (93%)
3. Neo-Pagan (90%)
4. Secular Humanism (83%)
5. New Age (82%)
6. Mahayana Buddhism (79%)
7. Mainline to Liberal Christian Protestants (79%)
8. Theravada Buddhism (77%)
9. Taoism (70%)
10. New Thought (61%)
11. Reform Judaism (61%)
12. Scientology (60%)
13. Christian Science (Church of Christ, Scientist) (50%)
14. Baha'i Faith (46%)
15. Hinduism (46%)
16. Sikhism (46%)
17. Nontheist (45%)
18. Jainism (44%)
19. Orthodox Quaker (43%)
20. Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormons) (24%)
21. Orthodox Judaism (22%)
22. Seventh Day Adventist (20%)
23. Mainline to Conservative Christian/Protestant (18%)
24. Eastern Orthodox (16%)
25. Islam (16%)
26. Roman Catholic (16%)
27. Jehovah's Witness (12%)

Silly memes.

1. What is your occupation right now? Field Services Representative (a fancy name for a trainer/sales rep)
2. What color are your socks right now? black with silver pirates
3. What are you listening to right now? Roo talking
4. What was the last thing that you ate? Goldfish crackers
5. Can you drive a stick shift? Yes
6. Last person you spoke to on the phone? my mother
7. Do you like the person who sent this to you/posted this? yes
8. How old are you today? 33
9. What is your favorite sport to watch? paint drying
10. What is your favorite drink? really good beer
11. Have you ever dyed your hair? yes
12. Favorite food? sushi
13. What is the last movie you watched? Lost in Space
14. Favorite day of the year? Halloween
15. How do you vent anger? talking...or painful torture
16. What was your favorite toy as a child? "Big Ted" - a stuffed bear I've had since birth
17. What is your favorite season? Fall and Spring
18. Cherries or Blueberries? both
19. Do you want your friends to e-mail you back? sure
20. Who is the most likely to respond? Random
21. Who is least likely to respond? Gypsy since she has already done it
22. Living arrangements? married with a child from my first marriage and two step-kids
23. When was the last time you cried? a few weeks ago when I found out my first-father-in-law has terminal cancer
24. What is on the floor of your closet? shoes and boxes of stuff
25. Who is the friend you have had the longest that you are sending this to/is reading this? Random
26. What did you do last night? played with the kids and on the computer and packed for my trip while Random was at band practice
27. What inspires you? nature
28. What are you most afraid of? bad things happening to one of my children
29. Plain, cheese or spicy hamburgers? cheese veggie burgers
30. Favorite dog breed? big butt
31. Favorite day of the week? Saturday
32. How many states have you lived in? three states and one other country

I should probably write about our vacation, but there is just not enough time in the day and I have to leave for Washington DC tomorrow and haven't even begun to pack yet. Basically, we had a wonderful time, enjoyed our time being child-free with no agenda for a couple of weeks, and saw lots of beautiful things. It was nice to come back home though.

You can see the pictures here if you want - http://www.mandmireland.snapfish.com

Seriously, fuck it up the ass with a rusty chainsaw.

My first-father-in-law just discovered that he has bone cancer in his spine. More tests are needed to figure out where it started. It isn't good. Not good at all. Roo is going to be devastated.

Based on the lj interests lists of those who share my more unusual interests, the interests suggestion meme thinks I might be interested in
1. disabilities score: 8
2. guide dogs score: 6
3. special education score: 6
4. accessibility score: 5
5. visual impairment score: 5
6. retinopathy of prematurity score: 5
7. disabled score: 5
8. disability rights score: 4
9. journalling score: 4
10. jake the rake score: 4
11. rehabilitation score: 4
12. dog guides score: 4
13. literacy score: 4
14. ada score: 3
15. adaptive technology score: 3
16. o&m score: 3
17. blind score: 3
18. social skills score: 3
19. personal growth score: 3
20. premature birth score: 3

Type your username here to find out what interests it suggests for you.
Popularity Ceiling: (Please be patient!)

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Who'd have thunk it. Bleh. Hopefully it will stop by the time I make it into Seattle tomorrow afternoon so I can at least try to enjoy some of my time in this state. I'd rather be at home.

I'm starting to not really care how broke we are, if we don't get a housekeeper again soon I'm probably going to end up widowed (and most likely in prison since I'm not so sure that a chainsaw and a couple bags of lime will really do the trick). I'm seriously not cut out for all the damn cleaning required to keep this house looking even halfway decent. Hmm...where can we cut costs? Maybe we can just leave the kids in the dog kennel all day instead of forking over about $18,000 a year in childcare costs.

We've made it a full year and I haven't even really wanted to kill him yet...much. Party!!!

Should you be MALE or FEMALE?* created with QuizFarm.com

You scored as Either You brain is neither specifically male, nor female in the way you perceive your surroundings. As bad as this may sound to some, it can easily mean that you are capable of combining both gender aspects to your advantage. Rather than being genderless you are possibly able think freely. This does not mean that you are bisexual or androgynous or indecisive, but it might. Either 68% Male 64% Female 57% Neither 14%

Well, we completed the 3-Day walk and more importantly, we raised over $4500 towards the battle against breast cancer. Thanks to all of you who have supported us over the past few months. We couldn't have done it without you. Don't worry, we won't be participating next year since we have some other things we want to do, but you'll be hearing from us again when we participate again in 2009. Consider this your advance notice since we would love to have you join our team. (Don't worry if you aren't a hardcore walker - plenty of people opted to take the comfy air conditioned buses back to camp after a few miles each day.)

We got to carry the Commitment flag for awhile. And yes, that is the full moon in the sky above us.


Okay, okay, so we only walked a total of about 57 miles. We took the bus after we reached this point on Day 2 and rode in comfort for the last couple of miles of the day. I'm pretty sure we made up most of that distance walking around camp and the airport. :)


These are just a few of the reasons why we walked. Susanne's heart is the marked with an arrow.


Texas was beautiful and we couldn't have asked for better weather.




You just gotta love our cheering squads!




Home sweet home (for 3 days)!

I finally get to take a hot bath again. And I managed to not dismember the LG&E guy or the plumber today so there is no need to dig holes in the cellar floor. Go me!