Sunday, November 21, 2010

Remembering Christmas

I know I am jumping the gun on this a little, since Thanksgiving is this week, but, this is what was on my mind this morning. Christmas to me was (and is) a magical time of year. I can remember Christmases when I was 4 years old, and as a family we would drive out to look at Christmas lights. One area in particular went all out, and every year we looked forward to seeing all of the decorations.

My mother would paint a huge Christmas scene on our living room picture window, and I was always amazed as I watched it take shape. One year it would be Christmas ornaments, another year would be holly and the words "Merry Christmas!" Each scene to me was special.

Of course, the idea of presents and Santa Claus always thrilled me as well. I know I started trying to find presents my parents might have bought, so I could "preview" the upcoming celebration, but I only succeeded once, and then was let down when nobody in our family got that present that year. In later years, I asked my parents about that. I had seen a beautiful red fire engine hidden deep in a closet. It turned out to be a present hidden in our house by friends of the family for their kids. No Fair!

I also remember the year I decided to try to catch Santa in the act. I waited until the house was quiet, then I creeped out to our family room area where the tree was located. There, I hid behind our sectional couch, where a door opened towards the back of the curved part of the sectional. That's where I was when I awoke the next morning. The sly, old Elf had put me to sleep before he made his delivery.

I have tried to carry on many of these traditions in my family today. We carol every year to friends, as we take them Christmas goody plates. We decorate the entire house, inside and out (more inside than out lately). We go out and see the decorations, and enjoy the season.

In all of this, we do one more thing. We remember and honor the "Real" reason for the season. We thank our Father in Heaven for the gift His son gave to all of us. We remember Him. We thank Him. We honor Him.

Have a Merry Christmas this year. Stick.

Wednesday, November 17, 2010

Awash in a Sea of Misery

So, we came from work and school Monday to find our basement flooded. I vacuumed water for two days until we could get a plumber to come and snake out our drain. He ran the snake out 75' and said he was pushing something from 60' on. Now, I just have to clean all the carpets, sanitize everything in the basement (I don't even like to think about what backed up out of the shower drain!), and do about 10 loads of laundry to wash everything that got wet. It never rains, but it pours ( or floods as the case may be).

Have a better (drier) day. Stick.

Sunday, November 14, 2010

Relief, Retraction, Regret

The issue with my Professor has been resolved. It was based on a misunderstanding on my part. Originally, I wrote my projects using a chart from our text. Unfortunately, I read the numbers backwards, so received a lower grade than I had hoped for. The professor also told me that I was missing some information from my project. I had e-mailed the project in, and several of my graphs did not show up on his end. I immediately sent these by fax, and then set about re-working the projects. I discovered my error, and sent the two re-written projects back to the Professor. Five days later, I received one of the projects in the mail, with a higher grade, but a note that said the numbers were still backwards. This is what caused my confusion. What I did not understand at the time was that this paper was NOT one of my re-writes that he had graded, it was the original paper graded again with my faxed graphs included in the grade!

I just received my rewrite grades on Friday. Both projects are now exactly what he wanted, and received full points. I am relieved, because these two projects form the core of my final projects for both classes, and had to be correct for everything in the finals to be correct. Can so spell RELIEF?

Onward and upward. Stick.

Tuesday, November 9, 2010

Mixed Signals

Recently, I wrote a couple of papers for my classes I am taking. The Doctor in charge of the classes returned them to me with several critiques, and asked me to rework the papers. As part of this, there were some facts and figures that he said I had backwards. I looked at them, and he was right. I reversed the numbers corrected the rest of the papers, and resubmitted.

I just got them back.

My grade was okay, but he says my numbers are still reversed! How!? He can't have it both ways. Either they were reversed originally, or they are reversed now. I am very confused. I will call him to find out what I am doing wrong, as these papers make the foundation for my final project in each class.

Sign me, confused in Wyoming. Stick.

Sunday, November 7, 2010

A Murder


They dragged him away
From his roots--his home,
And dropped him on
A huge slab of stone.

They topped off his head
With two quick cuts,
Then poked out his eyes
As they ripped out his guts.

With a poke in the nose,
And a few in the jaw,
They shoved a hot spark
Inside of his maw.

Now the fire glows
From inside of his head,
And poor Jack
Is dead, dead, dead.

Saturday, November 6, 2010

Bad Day

by Stick

It’s going to be a bad day.
I could tell it from the start.
I should have just gone back to bed,
But I wasn’t quite that smart.
It might have been the alarm going off
An hour before it should,
Or else it was the toast I ate
That tasted like burnt wood.

I hope that it gets better,
But I don’t have much hope.
I got ink on my hands,
And found we had no soap.
My grapefruit squirted right in my eye,
There were eggshells in my egg.
I knocked over my hot chocolate,
And it all ran down my leg.

There was something sticky in my left shoe.
The dog chewed up its mate.
I split my pants from stem to stern,
And dropped my bacon off my plate.
I stubbed my toe in the hallway,
Hit my head on the bathroom sink.
I pulled my white laundry from the dryer,
And found it all had turned bright pink.

I guess that I’ll get through it.
There’s nothing that can be done.
The morning’s quite half over,
Tho’ it hasn’t been real fun.
Now I have to hurry.
I’ve fallen way behind.
I’d stay a little longer,
But I’ve a briefcase I have to find.