SUMMER SOLSTICE, June 20, 7:09 P.M. EDT

ceocrocker

5 June 2012, 7:30pm
This evening Ally lost her 5th tooth!  The tooth fairy has been working overtime.  She lost her first 3 (on the bottom) over a month ago.  She lost #s 4 & 5 on Sunday and today.  Her top two front teeth.....we have to stop asking her to say "thistle" "teeth" "Christmas" and other fun words like that....maybe we will stop in a few days, it's too much fun right now!
On Thursday Ally will have her monthly port flush...an easy needle stick into her port to flush it with saline and heparin.  Ally is REALLY good with having her port accessed.  We have met (and heard) a lot of kiddos that are not okay with having their port accessed, which is totally normal...no kid wants to get stuck in their chest with a really big needle.  Ally is completely okay with the process; she doesn't use numbing cream, and just lays very still while the whole thing is going on.  I think she understands that it is easier for everyone if she just stays calm.  (Plus she has been doing it for 4 years, so she doesn't remember a time when she was not getting stuck with needles.)
Next weekend (June 16) is Ally's first dance recital!  I will be sure to post some pictures!
June 18th is my last day at work, and Ally's first day of swim lessons....summer is almost here!

(Top picture is of Ally on Sunday with one missing tooth.  The picture in the post is tonight, with 2 missing teeth, and dinner on her face.)

Just because it's so beautiful!

FULL STRAWBERRY MOON ~~ Monday * 4th June 2012 * 07:11:36 am (EDT)

Also known as Full Honey Moon, and Full Rose Moon. . . .

HE FOLLOWED ME HOME. CAN I KEEP HIM?

photo by lousyfocus

Written 4 hours ago

Today Ally graduated from Preschool!  She had a great year.  She is going to miss all her friends, and her teachers.  A couple of her friends from preschool will be at her Kindergarten next year. 

  
Even though Ally LOVED school, she is very excited for our upcoming summer.  She and Max are going to take swim lessons together.  Ally and another one of her friends are going to Dance Camp together, and, of course, we are headed back to Story Land!!!  That leaves us with 2 weeks over the whole summer with no plans....yet!  
Health Wise Ally is doing well.  She has lots of energy, she gives lots of hugs and kisses, and is even a bit naughty once in a while!  She is having a really hard time putting weight on.  We have decreased the pooping issue, and she has increased her food intake; but the scale still reads about 28 pounds.  This is frustrating for us (and for Ally, as we are constantly making her eat). 
I think I said it last time...but it feels like we have been running a marathon for the past 4 years, and finally having a break is great.  It makes everything a little easier.  I can't wait for 4 years of cancer treatment to feel like it was so long ago that I can't remember how absolutely draining it was.  Ahhhhh....moving forward.<
In a couple of weeks Ally will have her first dance recital.  She is very excited and nervous!  I am only allowed to take pictures during dress rehearsal, so I will make sure to post those.

Have a great Memorial Day weekend!

Jo's Clove Pinks settle in

Angie's Iris

Long ago, my second hospice patient, and beloved friend was moving.  Leaving her garden behind was breaking her heart, and she begged me to take, at least, her Iris.  At the time, I had no place for them, and wasn't anxious to do so.  She begged, bullied, and wept.  I took them, and found a place.  In retaliation for my reluctance, they put forth great blades of green and refused to bloom.  For ten years, they stubbornly refused.  Two years ago on a river bank renovation, Elmer's great caterpillar flattened and scraped away much of that garden.  I thought it was a dead loss, and wept myself.  In repentance, Elmer delivered an end-loader of composted cow manure.  I used it to reconstruct the garden.  Was amazed by fall to discover that some of the day lilies, and most of Angie's iris had survived.  Last year, again, the great green blades.

So imagine my surprise when I glanced over last night and found them *in bud*!  And this morning, the first in bloom!  Memories of one tough little lady, and an iris that shares that central core: surviving, and blooming when least expected.  Angie lived for three years as a hospice patient.  By every medical indication, she shouldn't even have made it as far as hospice.  Never underestimate the will of living things to survive and even thrive.

Sunday, 6 May 2012
 
 We have had a fun few weeks.
During April Vacation we made a trip to the Boston Aquarium.  When asked what her favorite part was, Ally replied, "Showing Daddy everything."  (This was Daddy's first time ever to the Boston Aquarium.)
Later in the week we met up with Auntie Stacy and Auntie Kelly in Portland, and visited the children's museum there.  We spent the night at Old Orchard Beach (the new picture was taken there...it was cold on the beach!).  The following morning we headed to the Dover Children's Museum and for mini golf.  It was a great mini-vacation.
This past weekend we visited Vermont for Daddy to compete in the Tough Mudder (google it....it's a 10 mile obstacle course up and down Mount Snow with obstacles such as jumping into a dumpster of ice water, running through hanging wires that are charged with electricity, and crawling through tunnels full of mud that are underground and grow increasingly more narrow....good times!).  Daddy and his friends who completed this crazy event had a great time!  Ally and I hung back at the hotel, as the crowd of 20,000 people would have been a bit much for her to handle.
This Thursday we are headed to the Make-A-Wish breakfast...always a worthy cause for any money that might be burning a hole in your pocket!
Ally has just a few weeks of school left, and I only have 6 weeks left...we are both very excited for summer.

That's all for now...hopefully the weather stays nice and I can upload some pictures of Ally outside.

Life feels really good right now....it's been a long journey, it's nice to take a break...

Rightly is he called "The Goobey"

Tonight. . . .

Edumacation. . . .

Shirlee, long and checkered educational career, lol! University of Utah, 1959 - 1962.  Moved to Maryland, worked a year, got married, University of Maryland, full time 63/64, undergrad; babies, 64 and 66; 68/70 also full time undergrad; BA, 1970.  University of Maryland 71 -- part time grad school; 72/73 full time, MA 73.  English w/ creative writing specialty (MD didn't offer a MFA 'cause they said no one could get a job with that degree, but they allowed the writers to take half of their classes in writing, and offer either a book of poetry or a novel as a Master's Thesis).  I did a novel, though as I was paying my typist 75 cents a page, 270 pages, I saw I should have gone for poetry at 40 pages or so, lol! Heck, I likely could have typed the poetry myself -- no MLA guidelines for poetry: the poet gets to decide, grin.

You'll note that's six full time years as an undergrad: I graduated with 180 "semester" hours.  Two causes -- transferring from a quarter system to a semester system.  I lost a lot of hours in the translation: if you had five quarter hours, the translation equaled 3.3 semester hours, and they accepted the hours, but tossed the extra third.  If you had 3 quarter hours, that equaled 2 semester hours, but was an hour short, so they made you re-take the class at three S hours to make up the missing hour.  Ditto for 2 Q hours (=1.33 S hours). Utah had  five hour classes and threes and twos. (Health 101 at Utah was a two hour class; at Maryland, also a two hour -- Q-hours > S-hours = 1.33.  Took the whole class over for the 2.3 hour. . . .)  Maryland virtually only three hour classes.  That coupled with Utah was rarely forward looking, and offered a multitude of course to fill each broad area: at Utah, I took anthropology to fill the psych/sosh requirement -- Maryland credited the hours, but *required* ONLY psych 101 and sosh 101. . . . etc. At Utah, I'd taken Genetics, Maryland *required* Biology 101 from everyone.  I took it. If I'd *entered* as a Freshman, I could have tested out of the BR (basic requirements), but as a transfer student, you couldn't transfer in into Honors.  Utah accepted a lot of high school classes -- American History/World History not for hours, but as filling those slots and let you take more advanced classes to fill the Field requirements.  Maryland didn't.

The other difference between the schools which struck me as exceeding odd was: at Utah, it was clear that the faculty was there FOR the students; at Maryland, the reverse was true -- the students were there FOR the faculty (to provide jobs).  Two examples: at Utah, often the head of the department would teach the freshman classes (my physics class, and Philosophy 101 were both taught by the department heads); at Maryland, *nevah*.  At Utah's registration, the advisors from each department would be given a classroom at the Union building: getting advised at Utah meant you never had to leave the building, and registration was in the ballroom.  At Maryland, advisors stayed in their own offices, and the students ran all over campus getting classes okayed.  I could register at Utah in a couple of hours.  Maryland often took two or three full days to do the same.

It struck me as full strange even then that the conservative state had the amazingly liberal university  and it was famously excellent and forward looking -- had degrees in fields where they were the ONLY one in the country that offered that degree.  Dance comes to mind -- other schools offered it as a specialty in PE, lol!  Their theatre department was stunning!  Maryland, the librul state offered a football U. . . . with very anal retentive requirements. . .

So why did I transfer at all, lol!?  At three years in at Utah, I had an equal numbers of hours in Philosophy, Theatre and English. I knew I could graduate in a year by concentrating on one of those fields.  But I loved them each, and couldn't make up ma mind, lol!  Had a best friend whose father had moved the family to MD so he could work for JFK's new HEW Department.  She'd dropped out of college and was working.  I had this wild hair that if I worked for a year, I could save enough for my senior year, AND decide which major I wanted to be, lol!  Mryna and Alec (the guy she was seeing) introduced me to the father of my future children the third week I was there, and Utah ended up not being an option.  I ended up majoring in English. You'll note that NONE of my potential majors were in fields with any kind of clear career path. . . .

TMI?

This is what I saved of the last month of the blog . . . . (and I kinda like the typos, so won't be changing them)

Shaking the dust from my feet. . . .

Saturday at 11:59 p.m.

Sunday at 12:00 a.m.

 

 So, they got neither the day of the week, nor the day of the month correct.  And this after multiple inquiries on their Facebook page, and a telephone call to HQ from a local blogger.

This I had typed on their facebook page.  But didn't hit send.  Decided not to throw more pearls before swine. . . .   The archives, BTW, are now permanently gone.  Book burning of the first water.  Swine doesn't begin to cover it.

When Jim inherited Howard's blog , DFA had close to a million names.  I joined Kos the same month, my number was 8743.  Kos is now at 341,310.  You have  39,919 likes on facebook.  You just killed the blog. Took you eight years, a ton of neglect, and some breathtaking incompetency to do it.  Congratulations.

Time to say goodbye to yesterday

Time to say goodbye to yesterday
This is where the cowboy rides away

Danube

And as the credits roll, the sad song starts to play
This is where the cowboy rides away

On the occasion of the possible last thread. . . .

Mars Sunset

This could be


This is the end
My only friend, the end
Of our elaborate plans, the end
Of everything that stands, the end
No safety or surprise, the end
I'll never look into your eyes...again
Can you picture what will be
So limitless and free
Desperately in need...of some...stranger's hand
In a...desperate land

Rendered by publius on April 26, 2012

[Its certainly not mine

By publius on Apr 26, 2012 8:44 PM EDT

just lifting lyrics and music of the Doors from Youtube and the some of the high cost filming of Coppola's Apocalypse
Documentary on them stated all credits on all recordings went to the Doors and not any of them individually including Morrison]

There's a new Pew Poll out

which rePublicans have taken as their own, as proving their superiority.  Since they hate so much Democrats doing it, I kinda wondered. . .   But then I remembered: IOKIYAR. . . .

And what they're puffing themselves up about?  They did better on a 13 question phone poll.  (I took it, got a hundred percent, but it didn't make me feel especially terrific.  First grade questions, lol!)  What the poll revealed, to me, was how badly we need some actual edumacation in this country.

This is the poll if you want to take it: 

Take the Quiz!

The other thing that puzzled me was *that* coupled with *this* --

http://dailycaller.com/2012/04/22/science-say-gop-voters-better-informed-open-minded/#ixzz1stzk1ZVV

Excerpt: On eight of 13 questions about politics, Republicans outscored Democrats by an average of 18 percentage points, according to a new Pew survey titled “Partisan Differences in Knowledge.” The Pew survey adds to a wave of surveys and studies showing that GOP-sympathizers are better informed, more intellectually consistent, more open-minded, more empathetic and more receptive to criticism than their fellow Americans who support the Democratic Party. [my empahsis]

 There doesn't appear to be any back up for this claim, and I *did* look.  Just repeats of the original post claiming same. 

So what we have is: 13 questions, and maybe five minutes time (Is that stretching it?  I dunno.) versus this: an in depth, twenty plus year study. . . . 

Study: Whiny Kids Become Republicans

From the Toronto Star:

Remember the whiny, insecure kid in nursery school, the one who always thought everyone was out to get him, and was always running to the teacher with complaints? Chances are he grew up to be a conservative.
At least, he did if he was one of 95 kids from the Berkeley area that social scientists have been tracking for the last 20 years. The confident, resilient, self-reliant kids mostly grew up to be liberals.
The study from the Journal of Research Into Personality isn’t going to make the UC Berkeley professor who published it any friends on the right. Similar conclusions a few years ago from another academic saw him excoriated on right-wing blogs, and even led to a Congressional investigation into his research funding.
But the new results are worth a look. In the 1960s Jack Block and his wife and fellow professor Jeanne Block (now deceased) began tracking more than 100 nursery school kids as part of a general study of personality. The kids’ personalities were rated at the time by teachers and assistants who had known them for months. There’s no reason to think political bias skewed the ratings — the investigators were not looking at political orientation back then. Even if they had been, it’s unlikely that 3- and 4-year-olds would have had much idea about their political leanings.
A few decades later, Block followed up with more surveys, looking again at personality, and this time at politics, too. The whiny kids tended to grow up conservative, and turned into rigid young adults who hewed closely to traditional gender roles and were uncomfortable with ambiguity.
The confident kids turned out liberal and were still hanging loose, turning into bright, non-conforming adults with wide interests. The girls were still outgoing, but the young men tended to turn a little introspective. [emphasis mine]

The original story from the Star is no longer available -- I picked this source because she has the most complete quote. 

Don't know when/where this was taken, but I love it! The ultimate survivors. . . .