Monday, April 23, 2007

I had grand plans to work on jewelry and my mother’s bookkeeping stuff this weekend. No go on either, although I did sort some of my jewelry stuff into the cool storage cart that I got for Christmas. Now I need to sort the bag of random beads into their compartments - these were beads that were scattered on my craft table when I ended up on bed rest. Mom helped me get that table cleaned up and cleared off for moving to the bedroom when I used it for my short time at home in bed. Now I need to get it set up again so that I can get back to beading.

Church was great, as always. Our pastor is doing a sermon series busting myths of the Christian faith. This week’s myth was “God will never give you more than you can handle” and it was appropriate in light of last weeks tragedy at VaTech. We sang two new songs, one of which is Tim Hughes’ When the Tears Fall.

When the Tears Fall
by Tim Hughes

I’ve had questions without answers
I’ve known sorrow, I have known pain
But there’s one thing that I cling to
You are faithful, Jesus You’re true

When hope is lost
I call You Saviour
When pain surrounds
I call You Healer
When silence falls
You’ll be the song within my heart

In the lone hour of my sorrow
Through the darkest night of my soul
You surround me, You sustain me
My defender for ever more

When hope is lost
I call You Saviour
When pain surrounds
I call You Healer
When silence falls
You’ll be the song within my heart

And I will praise You
I will Praise You
When the tears fall
Still I will sing to You
I will praise You
Jesus praise You
Through the suffering
Still I will sing to You

When hope is lost
I call You Saviour
When pain surrounds
I call You Healer
When silence falls
You’ll be the song within my heart

I will praise You
I will praise You
When the tears fall
Still I will sing to you
I will praise You
Jesus I will praise You
Through the suffering
Still I will sing to you

When the laughter fails to comfort
When my heart aches, Lord You’ll be there
When confusion is all around me
And the darkness is my closest friend
Still I’ll praise You
Jesus praise You

After church on Saturday we went out for a quick dinner so that we had a chance to catch with Denis, who was visiting to help Mom with some business stuff. We got home and I was feeding Jesse when the phone rang - it was Beau’s brother asking to take us to lunch on Sunday. So Jesse’s two uncles both got to see him this weekend.

Before church yesterday (Beau and I both had to be there; I for worship team, he for parking), we dropped Jesse at Marmie and Pop’s and had a quick photo shoot with Denis. I can’t wait to get those pictures - he’s a much better photographer than I am and he got some good shots. Plus it’ll be nice to have some photos of the three of us together. I’m sure we’ll get a bunch of pictures taken the weekend we go down to visit the Cooties next month, too.

So now it’s Monday and back to work. Now that Jesse is napping I better get to it.

I watched two movies this weekend. Both were slow paced, character stories. Both were rather mediocre, but one of them stood out as better.

First up, A Good Year, starting Russell Crowe and directed by Ridley Scott. Those two names are what led me to add it to the queue.

A British investment broker inherits his uncle’s chateau and vineyard in Provence, where he spent much of his childhood. He discovers a new laid-back lifestyle as he tries to renovate the estate to be sold.

It was a sweet enough, I suppose, but it wasn’t good enough for me to recommend it. The chateau was lovely though and I think my decorating style is leaning more French country. I love that rustic, old world look.

Second in the DVD player was End of the Spear - the story of American missionaries, including the well known Jim Elliot, who were murdered by the indigenous Ecuadorans they hoped to minister to. At least that’s what I expected. What I got was the story as told by the son of one of those missionaries, Steve Saint, but it was more a story about the Waodani tribe history and what led them to kill the missionaries. I appreciated seeing the story from that perspective - there is redemption there and it was moving. I do recommend this movie.

A Good Year - 2.5 stars out of 5.
End of the Spear - 3 stars out of 5.

Friday, April 20, 2007

My brain is all over the place today. Too much going on, I guess. Here’s what’s trapped in my head today:

1. I’m sick of the news. I’m a news junkie and I’m sick of the news. Sitting here I think that I’ll give it a miss tonight when I get home, but the sad reality is that I’ll check in for the headlines of the day. It’s the routine each evening.

2. I’m slightly bothered that the VaTech website does not list Cho Seung-Hui among the dead. I understand why the college hasn’t listed him, but it still bothers me.

3. The way the tribal council went down last night on Survivor was brilliant and completely redeemed an otherwise boring season. I keep thinking that the folks on the jury got quite a show just from the expressions on everyone’s faces - both shocked and smug. Can’t wait to see the fallout next week.

4. LOST continues to confuse and amuse. My favorite line from last night? Sawyer to Kate: “Do you want me to make you a mix tape?” Hilarious.

5. I’m on worship team this weekend. This means a busy weekend with Beau at the men’s breakfast tomorrow morning, me at practice in the afternoon followed by our usual attendance at the evening service. Then Sunday dawns early for my refresher practice, dropping Jesse at my parents’ for babysitting since Beau has parking lot duty that morning. Somewhere in there I want to work on my mother’s business accounting set up stuff. And the house is in need of cleaning.

6. I just remembered that I still need to make an appointment to get Annie’s kennel cough vaccination updated so that she’s good for the kennel on Mother’s Day weekend. And I need to reserve the kennel, too. We’re going to my sister’s for that weekend so that all the moms can be together now that I’m a mom, too. I can’t wait!

7. I’m working on getting my business license. I’ve got the completed forms in my bag. I just need to mail them and/or go to the court house to register as appropriate. I’ve started setting up an online shop at Etsy.com - I just need to clean and take pictures of the jewelry items I already have to sell and start making more for a good inventory. Mom has requested some things for her business, too.

8. So the prisoner medical task hit a snag yesterday. We pay most of the invoices by credit card. We have an online system that we use to track credit card payments and we have to reconcile our statements each month. I planned to work on that yesterday afternoon. After 4.5 hours I was finally on the last line item on the bill and I couldn’t find a corresponding line in my tracking worksheet. But I did find a lot of little amounts, so I figured the vendor lumped a lot of smaller payments into one (even though we tell them not to) and I grabbed my adding machine to start punching in numbers. No combination of those smaller amounts added up to the amount we were charged by the vendor. After 20 minutes with no success in my math, I gave up for the day in frustration.

I asked the woman who did this task before me and she laughed - apparently despite our specific requests to this vendor not to lump payments together, they do it anyway. And they never add up because the woman who does their billing has fumble fingers and transposes numbers all the time. And forget about getting any of the mistakes corrected. So we adjust our stuff to match the bills, which is what I did this morning.

On Monday, I’m going to see if there’s any way we can make it a little clearer to this vendor that they’re defrauding the government.

That about covers the brain dump for today. Except one more thing - I love my husband and baby more than anything in this world and I can’t wait to get home to them. *sigh*

I don’t have any orange clothing, but I am wearing burgundy today in honor of the VaTech families.

Related, our church had a candlelight-prayer service last night. It was moving to pray with folks for the VaTech community. Most moving was the compassion and intercession for the Cho family. Cards were given for us to write notes of encouragement and condolence to the families of those lost on Monday, including the Cho family. Sadly, they are apparently scared about reprisals and are in hiding - my prayer is that a community of friends would come along side that family to be light in this dark time and show them as much compassion as the families of their son’s victims.

Above all we pray that God would make His presence known to everyone affected by Monday’s events and that He would provide grace, peace, and comfort to all who mourn.

Psalm 86

A prayer of David.

1 Hear, O LORD, and answer me,
for I am poor and needy.

2 Guard my life, for I am devoted to you.
You are my God; save your servant
who trusts in you.

3 Have mercy on me, O Lord,
for I call to you all day long.

4 Bring joy to your servant,
for to you, O Lord,
I lift up my soul.

5 You are forgiving and good, O Lord,
abounding in love to all who call to you.

6 Hear my prayer, O LORD;
listen to my cry for mercy.

7 In the day of my trouble I will call to you,
for you will answer me.

8 Among the gods there is none like you, O Lord;
no deeds can compare with yours.

9 All the nations you have made
will come and worship before you, O Lord;
they will bring glory to your name.

10 For you are great and do marvelous deeds;
you alone are God.

Amen.

Thursday, April 19, 2007

New pics of the kid are up at WC.

Happy 10th anniversary to the Cooties.

It seems like just a little while ago that Jaynee and Denis got married on that beautiful April day ten years ago. I only have one photo from that day scanned…

I wish I had my favorite picture scanned - it’s of Jaynee and Denis standing on the lawn in front of Truro Episcopal Church. You can see the crowd of guests lingering on the steps behind them. The wind was blowing, which you could see by Jaynee’s drifting veil. The sky was bright blue with no clouds and the flowering trees were all in bloom. It was a truly lovely day and perfect for a wedding.

Here’s to many decades more wedded bliss.

Dial Idol got it right this time.

Buh-bye, Sanjaya.

Tuesday, April 17, 2007

First the TV stuff…

TAR-AS: I’ll be glad when this season is over. I think we need a longer break between seasons this time. Or just better contestants and challenges. The best part for me from Sunday’s episode:

In the Kuala Lampur airport, Mirna pushed Charla, who was standing on a luggage cart. In the Hong Kong airport, Charla popped out the wheels on her tennis shoes, and Mirna pulled her along. Next week, Mirna pops open a playpen and lifts Charla into it, telling her play quietly while Mirna stands in line for tickets.

[...]

Explaining one of the Detour options, Phil said, “Once here, they must climb up an 11-story bamboo scaffold, while avoiding an ongoing battle between stunt kung fu experts.” Best. Challenge. Ever.

The self-righteous anger of the teams irked at the BQs for using the Yield is laughable. They talk about the dirty play of the BQs since they used the Yield. Listen, whiners, the Yield is a legitimate part of the Race. You all play dirty by lying to travel agents or cab drivers or similar things that are not part of the organized Race. Using the Yield is not cheating.

Bah.

DwtS: Love Apolo Ohno. That is all.

24: Double Bah!

Now, from the DVD player…

Over the Hedge: Absolutely loved it. Sweet and hilarious. I can’t wait to watch it with Jesse when he’s old enough. A new children’s classic that I plan to buy for our DVD library. 5 stars out of 5.

For Your Consideration: I’ll be honest. I didn’t finish watching this one. I couldn’t get past the first 30 minutes, which was very disappointing because I love the Christopher Guest oeuvre. I believe he may have tapped out the mockumentary well at last - I didn’t laugh one time in the 30 minutes that I did watch. Makes me sad. 0 stars out of 5.

It never takes long for the blame game to start when a terrible thing happens. IMHO, it’s not the right to time to be second guessing the decisions that the police and college administrators made in response to the shootings yesterday. The investigation is still in its early stages and before they have the full picture, armchair QBs should keep their yaps shut.

I think that they made mostly right decisions based on the information that they had as events unfolded during the morning. We had a refresher on our OEP for the courthouse. Based on that training, which is excellent, there are three options in an emergency: full evacuation, partial evacuation, shelter in place. In the case of the VA Tech events, the way they handled the shooting at the dorm was appropriate. There was no reason to expect the carnage to come.

There’s a lot of misinformation roaming around - rumors upon rumors, a rush by the media to get the scoop, inaccurate/embellished eye witness accounts, etc. I am waiting for the fully finished investigative report before I start blaming anyone other than the shooter(s) for the deaths of those 32 people.

Monday, April 16, 2007

Today is crockpot cooking day. I thought I’d try making the crockpot peanut chicken recipe I found at the website for A Taste of Thai. But I was missing a couple key ingredients. Undeterred, I decided to experiment with my own recipe. It has been simmering away in the crockpot for the past several hours - I’ll let you know how it turns out later.

Here’s what I did:

1 packet each from Peanut Sauce Mix and Spicy Peanut Bake
1 can coconut milk
1 Tbsp minced garlic
1 medium onion, sliced into 1/4 inch rounds
2 sweet potatoes, washed and sliced into 1/4 inch rounds
2 Tbsp oil, divided
Salt and pepper
About 5-6 boneless, skinless chicken breasts

Directions:
1 Pour 1 inner envelope Peanut Sauce Mix, half of the coconut milk, and garlic into crock pot. Mix well.
2 Layer with onion slices and then with sweet potatoes. Brush sweet potatoes with 1 tablespoon oil. Salt and pepper to taste. Top vegetables with chicken and brush with remaining tablespoon oil. Lightly salt and pepper. Pour in the rest of the coconut milk.
3 Sprinkle chicken with 1 inner envelope of Spicy Peanut Bake Mix. Cover with lid and cook 4 hours on high or 6-7 hours on low.
4 Serve chicken with accumulated juices.

I plan to make jasmine rice to serve with the chicken and I’ll make some other veggie for me since I’m not a fan of sweet potatoes.

[UPDATE (6:15 pm)]: It was OK - the chicken was a bit bland; Beau liked the sweet potatoes. I’m going to tweak it some, but we both think it’s worth repeating.

Imagine my horror when I sat down to feed Jesse a little after noon to find this horrible news on the teevee:

BLACKSBURG, Va. — At least 22 are dead and another 21 are wounded after a shooting at Virginia Tech University Monday morning, police said.

I sat there wracking my brain to try to remember if we know anyone at VT. Turns out my step-cousin is a senior at Va Tech. My mom is calling her mother to get word on her safety.

My prayers go out for the families impacted by the sudden loss of their loved ones and for the students whose college memories will always be sullied by this senseless event.

[UPDATE]: Seems we know more students at VT than I could remember. My step-cousin is fine although she lives in the dorm where the first shooting occurred. Scary. All of our other friends’ kids at Tech are fine as well.

I mentioned last week that I was going to meet with my mom to discuss doing the books for her business. Turns out I spent the bulk of the day yesterday with my dad taking a look at the software we’re going to use for her accounting, inventory control, sales/purchases, etc. It’s a good package, but we realized that the nature of her business means there is quite a bit of work to get her set up. We’re hoping to get that part done in the next couple of months and then we need to start entering her sales data from January to the present. It’s a large undertaking that is long overdue, but will be great once we’re all caught up.

I realized about a hour into the process that if I do set up a business myself for the jewelry then I will have the exact kind of set up. It’s a daunting thought. In my favor is that I’m not too far into the wholesale/retail sales side of things, nor do I have the inventory quantity that Mom has so my set up shouldn’t take nearly as long. But still…

It almost makes me want to keep it as a hobby. Almost.

Friday, April 13, 2007

Beau’s letting the department powers-that-be at GMU that he’s interested in teaching a few classes this summer and in the fall that they’re listing as open. We’ll see what comes of that. I’m feeling optimistic since one of the classes is the one he’s currently teaching and another is one that he taught at JMU.

In the meantime, I believe my telework will be easier now that I’ve proven the cable modem is the way to go. And now that we’re moving to ACH payments over checks means that it’ll be easier for me to justify more time at home since I will be typing fewer checks.

Life is good.

I love The Office.

Last night’s episode was brilliant from the first moment to the last.

More Darrell, please.

Thursday, April 12, 2007

My mother, sister, and I are all working on separate business ideas. Mom’s way ahead of Jaynee and I since she’s had her business for a number of years already. I’ve managed to sell some jewelry in the past year, mostly via my friend Joanie’s shop (that she closed recently). Jaynee just started her Something Simple Art and has already sold two pieces.

Somehow we’re trying to figure out a way to all live in the same area so that we can have some kind of family business together. This is the dream for the three of us.

Working toward that, I’ve always helped Mom with stuff and I’ll soon become her official bookkeeper - we’re going to meet this weekend to discuss it in further detail. We had talked about me doing this a couple of years ago, but then I met Beau and that year became the year of The Wedding. Then I got pregnant and last year was the year of The Pregnancy. Although we now have The Baby, I believe I’m at the point where I can devote a few hours each month to work Mom’s books. In addition, Mom’s really hoping to move her website to an online store with the help of Denis, our family web designer.

I have a goal of getting back to jewelry making by the start of summer and a further goal of getting my pieces photographed for an online store through Etsy.

See? A family business…

I still need to go about getting a business license, but in the meantime I’ll just manage it as a profitable hobby, keeping track of my revenues/expenses to see what kind of taxes I’ll need to report.

Anyway, it’s all fun to think about and plan and work on. We’ll see what comes of it.