Aloha

Aloha! Just stopping in to say hi from Maui. We're getting ready to go to a New Year's party with Judy's sister Claire. We'll be grilling lobsters on the beach! Tough way to ring in the new year...

Hope everyone is having fun. See you soon!

Love - K & S

A Christmas Story

We're watching part of the 24 hours of A Christmas Story marathon. Ralphie just got his Little Orphan Annie decoder ring!

We both have decided that this is THE perfect movie. I love every scene. We've already seen the tongue stuck to the pole, the A++++++, the "Oh, fuuuuudge", the lamp, and "who's my little piggie?"

Anyway - hope everyone is having a good Christmas!

ps - the mother just broke the lamp while "watering the plants". :)

Christmas cheer?

Our neighbor's house. I think this qualifies as ironic...







During the day.










Lit up like a...you know the rest.

Christmas and photos

Tess and Kirsten, When we talked this week I forgot to mention that I mailed all of your presents to my parents house. You should call or email her (dlstump@yahoo.com) to see if you want to stop by and pick them up or if she and my dad will be out in your area to drop them off. I hope you like them!!!

Second, can either of you email me pictures you took from your trip out here this summer? I need to update my "Visits from Us" photo ablum. I bet there are some good drunken ones from lunch at the wine and cheese shop!

Cindy

Remember when Scott was stripping the wall paper in the spare bedroom upstairs and found a bunch of fun writings, pictures, and what not all over the walls? We got to meet the Cindy who was partly responsible for these fun scribblings! Cindy Hetler, brother of Chris Hetler who visited us the previous night, came over to apologize for her brother's intoxicated intrusion.

Upon hearing her name, I insisted that she come in and look around. I knew that we'd be able to get some stories out of her. When asked about the wall writings, she broke out into gails of laughter. Apparently, just prior to putting up the lovely psychedelic wallpaper with pink, orange, and green flowers, their mother gave them permission to go to town on the walls. Hence the "Draft beer not students" and series of boys names intermittently crossed out or circled with hearts.

We promised to have her over again some time so that she can reminisce, and also so we can learn about the history of this house.

Just for laughs

Light a Candle for Aids

Bristol-Meyers is donating a buck every time someone lights a candle at this link. It's pretty easy...go do it!

Christmas Albums

We got trapped by the Christmas Album display at Best Buy the other day. Scott, can you shed light on the Twister Sister Christmas album?? I mean really, what were they thinking?

Also, I think each of you has the Peanuts Christmas album, which one is the original and which one is the best? Our Holiday music supply is very limited and we need a suggestion or two to beef it up!

Anything but homework

Ok, so I have only ONE thing to complete for my class. Yet, I'm finding things all over the internet that I MUST do first.

I give you my celebrity-look-alike collage:

White album

I know you all know this already but the white album is such a great album to sit down and listen to!! I played it Sunday afternoon after not listening to it probably in years. Yet somehow the lyrics to all of the songs come back to you as if you just heard it yesterday. Josh wasn't as impressed, he asked if there were any songs that DIDN'T make it on the album. I am still working on his Beatles education!!

I've got my excuse

They're finding evidence for "chemo brain". I'm not saying I have chemo brain or even these types of effects all the time. But I do have days where it seems really hard to string thoughts together, focus my attention, or recall things. I haven't figured out any particular trigger for these not-so-sharp days. Diet, stress, enough sleep, weather? Like other labels, it might just be easier to use "chemo brain" as my excuse.

Time to play...

...our favorite game!


Jeweled office accessories... are they Classy, Tacky, or Stupid?

Thanksgiving Recovery

So I may be the only person who feels this way but it is a good thing I have to go back to work tommorow!! I have learned what I do with a great deal of free time. I eat a lot, sleep a lot, watch football, movies and shop! Overall not a very productuve member of society!! As far as the shopping goes, we went out on Friday for FIVE hours which included standing in line at Kohl's for an hour!! It was worth it - we have about 75% of our shopping for Christmas done.

By the way, one of the movies we saw was Borat. Has anyone else seen it? We both agreed that we felt dirty after watching it.

Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving!!

A fascinating article

Hey all,

I may not be the first person to stumble across this article on homosexuality, and I KNOW I'm not the first to think this way. But, it's good readin' if you haven't seen it yet, especially as it comes from a Baptist minister.

Thanksgiving

Hello! So what does everyone have planned for Thanksgiving?? We had thought about hosting dinner for some of our friends but our friend Faithe insists on cooking Thanksgiving dinner (she starts 3 days ahead of time). So we are going over to her house for dinner and our (which really means Josh's) only obligation is to bring dessert. At first I was a little disappointed at not getting to cook a turkey (I've only done it twice before) but then when I was watching the food network and they had all these specials about making the perfect turkey, I felt a great sense of relief to not have to worry about it!

Negative Ads

I know you are NPR newsies and may have already heard this but it is really funny! Hang in there until the 3 minute mark when they start reading nursery rhymes.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6444183


Enjoy!

Is this news?

(Photo credit: Larson/Grand Rapids Press/AP Photo)

I have a love-hate relationship with this story. Some might say it is sort of light-hearted, and a welcome break from scandal, war, and the economy. Not me. I've been more cynical about it. Maybe because I've seen all too much of it - this picture/link comes from NATIONAL news! Why are people interested in this? ARE people interested in this? Is it a point-and-laugh situation ("look at the silly deer")? Is it commentary on the impact humans have on animals?

What will happen to the deer now that it's free from it's plastic restraint? Well, it's hunting season...fortunately for the deer, it is now thin and unappealing as a catch.

New project

Bye-bye ugly wallpaper!



Someone's been busy whilst I've been doing homework!

Creeping Progress

Hmmm...sometimes it seems like progress in this room is measured in INCHES! (Pun definitely intended...) When I opened the door yesterday to start measuring for the shelves, I realized that something like 2 weeks had passed since I'd even been IN the room! Sheesh. NOW the problem is, Tess says she wants shelves like this built into ALL the rooms. Yah. Right.

MI results

Interesting. I never would have pegged the UP as democratic...