Gggrrrrr

One of the many things that piss me off so much about this oil gusher (I refuse to call it a "leak") is the suffering of the sea animals. I feel so helpless. It breaks my heart to see the beautiful birds, turtles and marine life covered in sticky crude not mention dieing from it. It's criminal the way BP is handling this catastrophe. I could go on and on but I'll spare you. A friend posted this on her facebook page. Every little bit helps. Take a good look and see what you recognize.

Happy first day of SUMMER!

This is the lighthouse beach in Chatham on Cape Cod.

Heading there this weekend :-)

Lost at Sea

We won't win any Parents of the Year award anytime soon but neither will these parents.

This is Abby Sunderland, she's just 16 years old and her parents allowed her to sail around the world alone, by herself, solo in a 40 foot boat. Now she's missing in the Indian Ocean. Last night her EPIRB locating device was activated. I'm sure Abby is a good sailor but how much experience could she have had in her lifetime? Certainly not enough to circumnavigate around the world. Apparently the search is on in the Indian Ocean between Africa and Australia. That's a lot of ocean to cover and the water is frigid. They hope she's wearing her survival suit.

I pray that they find her and she's alive and well. Her young life is just beginning. But I can't for the life of me understand why her parents would let her do this. Her brother did it last year and no double standard here, I don't think he should have done it either. I'm sure her parents are questioning themselves right now and I suppose now is not the time to throw stones at them. Please let her be found, one way or another for her and her parent's sake.

Edit~Abby was found alive thank goodness. I'm happy for her and her family. I still believe she should not have been out there alone.

I'm just sick over this.

Remember what this day stands for...

Heartbreaking

Last February in Tampa Bay...

This May in Chandeleur Sound.

This oil spill is criminal. I admit I don't know anything as far as procedures regarding drilling in the ocean go but how can BP or any other oil company for that matter be allowed to drill without any plan for a disaster like this. The devastation is catastrophic. The poor animals and marine life not to mention the livelihood of the fisherman and the money lost from lack of tourism. Sinful.

I Love Bret Michaels

Today in the garden

A beautiful day today...

our newest addition, a purple rhododendron
Coral bells

was a dahlia

poppies

Scotch broom

peonies,

they smell delicious

geraniums

I don't get it

My son is home from college for the summer and will be working 40 hours per week at Ben & Jerry's where he's the store manager. He plans on living off campus in September so he needs all the $$ he can get.

He's been home since May 14 but still unpacking his stuff (which is covering his room, so much so that he's sleeping in his brother's bedroom. It's really the guest room I guess since Kevin doesn't live here anymore but I still call it his room.) As he was packing up his dorm room he noticed things missing. When he came home in December he forgot his electric razor at school. When he returned it was gone. Coincidentally a few weeks previously the college placed a new student in their suite because he didn't get along with his current roommate. When he came back from Christmas break Billy was gone, transferred to another school.

Fast forward to the end of the year and packing up. Turns out he's missing 3 PS2 games, an X-Box game and a bunch of DVDs. His roommate was also missing some games, a guitar hero controller and a few other things. The razor Cam took responsibility for, he left it in the suite's common bathroom but the things missing from his room, well his roommate left for Christmas break after Cam and didn't bother to lock their room.

I don't get why someone would steal someone else's stuff. Wait, I suppose I do get it. Some people see something they want and don't want to work for it, or maybe they don't have the money for it or they're just opportunistic. The bad thing about it is that Billy probably didn't think twice or feel any guilt. It's a bitter pill to swallow when you wouldn't think of doing that but someone does it to you.

This is a busy time of year in kindergarten. We're starting to wrap things up, making class lists for their first grade next year, we can see the light at the end of the tunnel. Only about 7 weeks to go. This past week our kindergarten went to the zoo. We have a half day program so there are 2 classes in the morning, 2 classes in the afternoon. On zoo days first the morning class attends for the entire day, going to the zoo and eating lunch in the cafeteria and the afternoon class has the day off. The next day is reversed. They're thrilled to buy lunch and eat in the cafeteria. Not all want to do that so they bring their lunch. That being said, what do these four items have in common?

A full can of Pringles...

A chocolate covered, cream filled donut...

A cup of cookies...

And a regular Coke.

They are what a kindergartner brought for her lunch. I couldn't believe it. I took her can of Pringles, opened it and put a stack in a baggie. She was mad and didn't understand why I wouldn't let her take the whole can down. I just couldn't in all good conscience. I think my blood sugar went up just looking at her lunch. Geez, what were her parents thinking? I guess maybe they weren't. Anyway at the zoo...

we saw the two white Rhinos.

My students are always surprised when I say I don't like monkeys. I find them creepy and this is why. Look at those teeth and they're always picking at each other then eating the bugs they find. This is an Olive Baboon.





I've been to the zoo many times and this is the first time I've ever seen one of the polar bears outside. They have absolutely no human contact. Look at those feet.






Now I thought this little guy was cute, a plated lizard. He smiled for the camera.

Poison frogs from the rainforest. Sorry they're blurry.

There are two elephants; one named Lilac because Rochester has a park full of lilacs and every May there's a huge festival and the other is Genny C named after the river that runs through the city, the Genesee. Or maybe named after the beer brewed here, Genesee Beer. I'm not sure why she put the straw on her head, maybe she was entertaining us because the kids loved it.

This was the cutest couple. They loved watching the children on the playground. I hope I'm like that if I get to that age.

Happy Mother's Day!

Wishing you a peaceful day

surrounded by those who love you.

Duane Jackson

Our Hero...

Mr. Jackson was the person who noticed the parked SUV in Times Square and brought it to the attention of the police.

I spoke with my son on Sunday and asked him if he's nervous living in NYC and got the answer I wanted to hear. "Yes" he said. Maybe not nervous but the thought of terrorism is on his mind when he takes the subway. That pleases me because it tells me he is alert and conscious of his surroundings. The last time I was in the city was December 2009 and while in the subway in Chinatown the platform was jam packed. I realized that if anything were to happen there is absolutely no place to go. I have plans to return to New York City, to Times Square actually. The Discovery Channel has a King Tut exhibit where I saw the Titanic exhibit last July.

I still love NY

I love to visit New York City and have been there many times. It's a vibrant, exciting, and historical place. You can get anything you want there; Broadway shows, museums, beautiful architecture, shopping and learn about our country's early history. That being said, I want my son to move out of New York City! I don't care if he doesn't move back to his hometown, I just want him gone from NYC. For heaven's sake he has an emergency backpack ready to go with essentials in his apartment in case of evacuation. I realize that things like this can happen anywhere these days but damn if NYC isn't the target most often. In another thwarted attack someone tried to explode a car bomb last night in Times Square. Read about it here.

Why do the crazies of the world love NYC so much? I get that its very populated and I guess they feel they'll get the most bang for their buck (no pun intended). My son and his girlfriend never go to Times Square but that doesn't ease my mind. They do take the subway into Manhattan for work, actually Kevin has to take three trains to get to the hospital. I know for a fact that they were in Manhattan last night down in the financial district.
If you've ever been to Times Square you know it NEVER looks like this. It's constantly clogged with traffic and pedestrians. I'll still continue to visit the Big Apple but in a shout out to my first born, pack up you and your gf and get the hell out of dodge.

There's this volcano in Iceland...

I watched SNL last night and their opening bit was a skit with Kristin Wigg as the Icelandic singer Bjork. She was being interviewed by "Larry King". Well just click here to watch it for yourself. It make me laugh.

As did this cartoon from our newspaper. I've listened to the pronunciation of this volcano and don't understand it and read it phonetically and still can't say it.

*

But in all seriousness, I feel bad for all affected by the ash, the stranded travellers and the economic fallout to mention a few. But most of all I feel for the animals that live in the area of the volcano. What about the people who live there you may wonder, don't you feel bad for them? Certainly I do, their homes are covered in ash and their possessions ruined. I can't imagine the clean up involved. As for the people that stayed and didn't evacuate; well yes, they're living in virtual hell right now but why didn't they LEAVE? Rescue crews went in to get them and they had to be rescued themselves. By staying not only do they place their own lives in jeopardy but the very lives of those who go in after them. Similar to people who choose to ride out hurricanes rather than evacuate.

*

The animals couldn't be evacuated. Horses, livestock and the poor swans are swimming in ash covered water. Please take a minute and watch this. We joke about it because we're not living it. Eventually the ash will circle the globe and we'll all feel the effects to one extent or another.

People of Wegmans

One online site I visit regularly is People of Walmart. I'm always amazed that people go out in public looking the way they do. We have WalMarts in my town and I always have my camera with me but somehow never see any of those beauties that show up on that site. BUT...

Having my camera with me finally paid off although not at WalMart. We happen to be in Wegman's, a chain of grocery stores here and as it was we were in the more upscale store. Imagine my surprise when I saw this...

I couldn't believe it. A guy with real metal armor on his leather jacket. Totally out of the blue in a store where you see people in fur coats shopping for groceries.
He stopped at the Indian food bar and I couldn't resist snapping a picture. I had to do it fast and I sort of felt bad doing it. My son said he'd probably pose if you asked him and he'd tell us all about the world he lives in but I couldn't ask. My other son felt right at home since he see weird outfits in NYC all the time.

Happy Birthday

Since Wednesday our oldest has been in from NYC and his brother came home from school yesterday. It's been nice having the two of them here, just like old times. I'd better not get too used to it because Cam goes back to school tomorrow and Kev returns to NYC on Monday. While they're both here we celebrated Cam's birthday out at a Japanese hibachi restaurant called Plum Garden. I'd never been to this type of place and we had a lot of fun.

One of the first things I noticed was these little cuties at our table. His shirt made me smile.

The boys had fun catching rice balls tossed by the chef.

I passed on that.


My steak was delicious, I just wished for french fries instead of fried rice.

Music to my Ears

There's much to love about my new car. The smooth, quiet ride, the heated leather seats which I have to say are pretty awesome and fantastic when you have cold like we do here in western New York. But what I love the most and didn't think I cared about is this...

Sirius XM Radio. I have a short commute to work, seriously, three minutes, four on a snowy day but in that time I never hear any music because all the morning shows do for the most part is TALK. So everyday on the way to school I would listen to my Allman Brothers CD, Blue Sky to be specific.

It's a nice, calm song to start your day with if you're going to be working with 30 kindergartners.
Back to XM radio. I LOVE it. No commericals, no talk, okay maybe a smidge but it's 99.5% music. I love that I can listen to any genre I want and most of the time its set to 60's on 6, 70's on 7 or 80's on 8. Where else can you hear these blasts from the past like Tubular Bells from The Exorcist movie, Too Shy by Kajagoogoo, Manic Monday by the Bangles which I didn't know this, was written by Prince. I even learned that Rogers is his last name. Then there's Bobby Sherman's Julie, Julie, Julie, Do you love me? Don't laugh, I loved Bobby Sherman, in 1970 when this song came out I was 12 years old.

Or how about Men Without Hats and the Safety Dance? Gotta love it.

Another song from 1968, I was 10 years old; Jeannie C. Riley's Harper Valley PTA. You don't hear that on regular radio.






Lest you think I'm about the cheese, here's another favorite from 1970's recorded by Janis Joplin for her album Pearl just several days before she died. I also learned that Kris Kristofferson and Fred Foster wrote this song. I love me some Kristofferson and that raspy voice. On a side note, A Star is Born, great movie with Babs.



Another blast from the past, Gordon Lightfoot 1979. This song can bring on the tears.




I don't listen to much popular music of today, I prefer to remain in the past with the songs of my youth. At times it brings back such happy memories and other times makes me feel blue for the time gone by and what once was.

Before I even got in the car to drive home from the dealer I'd decided that I'd use the free three months of the XM radio and that would be that but now $12.95 a month is a small price to pay for all of these memories.

Pay it Forward

I'm not a fan of golf. I have no interest in playing or watching it. I sometimes watch The Masters because of the beauty of the course with the flowering trees and grounds. Other than that, it's too slow. (I grew up as a rink rat and hockey's my game. That sport makes everything look slow) Hubby plays golf in a league and almost every week he comes home and complains about his game. I see his frustration and ask "why do you play it then?" For me, if it's frustrating, forget it, I have no interest at all. I hate the feeling of frustration.

*

What makes me write about golf today? I read a story (read it here) about professional golfer Phil Mickelson. His wife and his mother are both suffering from cancer and being treated by the same physician, Doctor Tom Buchholz of Houston's M.D. Anderson Center. Over the weekend at a PGA event, The Shell Houston Open, Mickelson invited Dr. Buchholz and some other medical staff to said tournament. With three holes left Mickelson was out of contention so he asked Drl Buchholz if he would like to caddy for him.

I thought this was a very uplifting story. I seldom read the comments on stories but decided to read more than a few on this one. I'd say that of the comments I read 95% were positive. But you know there are always a few who have to piss all over things. One commenter called Mickelson unprofessional. Another said it was strategic and fake. Someone asked how it made the doctor look, as in he was asked to be a slave to carry his bag. Still another said the doctor didn't deserve it, he makes millions off the sick. Some guy wondered why Mickelson would even bother asking the doctor.

*
People, lighten up. I don't know how it was unprofessional, if it was a problem some PGA official would've been all over it. Do you really think the doctor took the gesture to caddy as some form of degredation? As far as making millions, I'm not sure many doctors make millions anymore and if they could save the life of my loved one they deserve every penny. As far as asking the doctor to caddy, for me, if someone is doing something or taking care of someone I love I would want to show them any kind of thanks that I could and I thought this was perfect for Dr. Buchholz.

Tiger could learn a little about character from Phil.

No Pretty Pictures Today

Why are some people so inconsiderate of others around them? Why are they so rude when they don't have to be? Why do they act like it's all about them? I wondered that twice today.

*

Case number one~ Public restrooms; I try to avoid them at all costs but sometimes nature has other ideas. Today I was in JC Penny at a nice mall when I used the ladies room. Do they leave their own bathroom like this, with toilet paper all over the floor and pee on the seat? I open a stall and see that someone, to put it bluntly has left their shit unflushed. Now of course I could go in, flush the toilet and use it myself but for some reason I just can't. I open another stall and see another women and I use the term loosely has not flushed and she's riding the crimson tide. GROSS. Just flush the freakin' toilet because I can't.

*

Case number two~People that throw things out of their car. That's littering but this went beyond that. We come out of the grocery store and I see that someone has thrown the contents of a cup of something out into the lot, not just on the asphalt but all over the side of my car door. Now in all honesty I sometimes will empty the ice out of a drink into the parking lot but I throw the cup away. As hubby pulls out of the parking space we see two Coke cans that were under our car. The world would be much more pleasant if people didn't behave like animals. Oh but wait, animals don't foul their own nest.

*

Okay, rant over.

It's a Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood

I'm coming to you today from the swing on my back patio. It's a beautiful day, the sun is shining, the birds are singing and it is warm out. Yesterday in good old Rochester New York we broke a temperature record with a high of 86 degrees at 3:30 PM. I don't think it got that warm once last summer. I'm just crossing my fingers that this isn't our "summertime".


Thanks to the the cool, crappy summer of 2009 our utility bill went down 30 bucks a month. We're on the budget billing system which means we pay the same amount every month to avoid those gigantic heating bills in the winter. As a matter of fact we had paid so much over our actual usage that for the next two months we don't get charged at all!


Now several things may have contributed to this change of usage. For one thing as I said, last summer was so horrible that I think we used our central air all of two times. Trust me, central air will cause your electric meter to spin wildly. Also now that we're empty nesters for most of the year there are no kids at home leaving every light on in the joint, running their computers and charging all their electronic devices.


I should mention that I spent 18 years of my life working for our utility company and one of my jobs during that tenure was to adjust customer's budget billing. If I saw a substantial drop in some one's usage it could be for several reasons. If their gas and electric meters are in the basement and the meter reader couldn't get in every other month to read them we'd be estimating the bill based on previous usage. The customer may be calling in the reads after reading the meter themselves and not reading it correctly. Or maybe the meter is running slow and is ready for a systematic meter change. Most likely what I'd do is make arrangements for a special read which means contacting the customer and making an appointment to get inside to get an actual read.

Well our both of our meters are outside and are read every other month by a meter reader so I'm chalking it up to the fact that the two of us don't use as much electricity or gas to heat our house, water heater and dryer as we did when there were four of us living here.