No Gas!

Rachael had an ultrasound of her gall bladder and guess what!!! She has gall stones. This is what has been causing all the pain in the middle of the night!

Her doctor had recommended not to eat fatty foods and stay away from heavy dairy like ice cream. She has been doing good these last 2 weeks now that she has changed her diet. The doctor said that she may even need to prop herself up on some pillows while she sleeps.

They don't like to operate on pregnant women unless absolutely necessary. If she can control it mostly by adjusting her diet, she'll be fine. The doctor said that they may induce her a little early so it will help her pain because often it resolves itself after delivery, but if it doesn't, then she will need surgery.

Since she is due Nov. 6th, I jokingly have been telling her that she will have the baby on Halloween! She said "You would say that mom!" I like to have fun on Halloween and decorate like crazy so she knows how I am. Then they told her about inducing her a little early and I said "See Rachael, I told you your baby will be born on Halloween!" I laughed and she shot me daggers, lol!

Now all I need is something to change her bitchy attitude! She is getting real bad!!!!

On another note, about a week ago, she was driving to work. Two huge dogs ran out in front of her and she hit the second one. She said she didn't know what else to do. She slammed on her brakes but if she swerved to the left, she would have hit the first dog, if she swerved to the right, she would have went up on the sidewalk and into someone's backyard or an electrical pole. There was nothing else she could do.

She was ok but very shaken up. The dog did a number on her car. The front bumper was hanging off, the grill was busted out, the hood bent, the front frame bent, the right headlight falling out, and the blinker busted! After she was done crying (she felt bad for the dog), We teased her saying that she didn't hit a dog, it was a deer! For some reason, she doesn't find that as funny as the rest of us, lol.

Now we have to get her car fixed. My niece's husband can fix it and so he will be doing all the work. Right now, my husband screwed on the bumper so it won't fall off. The light is in but needs adjusted so it won't blind the oncoming traffic. She isn't driving it at night until she gets it fixed but now she wants to drive my car.

I wish I had got pictures of the car as soon as she got home. It was so bad. I didn't know a dog could do so much damage.

A Little Scary

Last night (around 11 pm) Rachael got pains in her back and in her stomach. This has happened once before about a week ago. It hurts her so bad that she can't stand, sit, lay down, or even talk. The pain makes her nauseous. She even threw up last night.

I called her Dr.'s office and it gave me another number to call for an OB nurse. I had to leave a message with the answering service and the nurse had to call us back. It took 30 minutes for the return phone call. The nurse asked a bunch of questions and said that she had no clue what it could be. Then she told Rachael to go to the hospital and have OB Triage check her out.

She brushed her teeth and hair, called her boyfriend, and boss (she had to work in the morning), and then we went. As we drove to the hospital, the pains started to go away. By the time we got there, the pains were gone, of course!

Jerry, her boyfriend, met us there. The nurse hooked her up to the monitors to check the baby. Everything with the baby seemed to be OK. Thank God for that! No signs of preterm labor either. So what is this mystery pain that wouldn't happen at the hospital?

The only thing they could come up with we severe gas pains!!! That's it?? All this for gas! I understand gas is very painful because I've had it bad after one of my surgeries. It moved up into my shoulder area and I felt like I wanted to die! The severity of pain she was having, and the location of the pain was very similar to the pain I get when my hiatal hernia acts up! I told her that I get that kind of pain from it and she said I better not have cursed her and passed it on to her! Nice kid, huh, lol!

She was only at the hospital a little over an hour and was discharged. I'm glad they don't think it's anything else but I wish they knew for sure! They told Rachael to make a Dr.'s appointment for today or Tuesday. Her Dr. is out this whole week so she had to make an appt. with the NP. She goes tomorrow morning. We'll see what they say!

Amy Lynn

My oldest daughter, Rachael (19), is pregnant. This is my first grandchild. I am very excited to be a grandma, even though I'm only 38. I think that being a young grandma will be fun.

At first I was a bit disappointed because she is in college and I wanted her to finish before she had any kids. It only takes 2 years to get an Associates Degree and she is now finished with the first year. Now there is going to be a baby shortly after the next school year begins. Rachael is due November 6th. I think she will need to start a semester later and finish a bit later than she would have. Even though I wanted her to finish school first, I am still thrilled to be a grandma. This baby is a blessing no matter when she comes to us.

On Monday the 15th, Rachael had an ultrasound. She was 19 weeks, 3 days pregnant. We found out that the baby is a little girl. I was hoping it would be a girl a little bit more than a boy. I don't really care either way as long as everything is ok. I just think little girls are much more fun to shop for because there is much more to choose from. I already bought some things :) ...just today!

While we were at the ultrasound, the ultrasound tech kept trying to get pictures of the baby's heart but she kept curling up and turning so that she couldn't get the pictures she needed. She had Rachael turning from side to side, then she had her go empty her bladder...still the baby would not get into the position needed. Finally, the tech had the Dr. come in and the Dr. got the pics she needed. We were in the u/s for a little over an hour...much longer than needed, lol! It was well worth it. We found out that everything looked good. The baby, who will be named Amy Lynn (first and middle name), weighs 11 ounces and is 57% in growth. I am so pleased that everything is fine!

I have some u/s pictures of her.

This one is a 3-D picture of her. She still looks like a little alien, lol! I love it no matter what she looks like!








This one is cute because it looks almost like she has her mouth open and going to put her hand in her mouth but it may be shadowing I see, I'm not too sure.






This one is my favorite picture. I think it's so sweet how she is crossing her ankles. When I do this, it's not cute anymore, lol! This is cute and very sweet. How I wish we could all stay that way!

Andrew: Part 3

First I would like to start with my apologies for not blogging in that last month. I have 2 jobs outside the home and also a house to clean, shopping to do, and errands to run. I do get on the computer to play poker often but I'm not always on there for real long periods of time. I just do it to relax after work and at the same time, on another tab, I watch my soap! I also play while I do things around the house because I use my laptop so it can go from room to room with me. Blogging is something I like to sit down and do uninterrupted, so i can concentrate on what I'm saying.

Since the last time I blogged, we still needed to have Andrew come over and get his car and our broken down van that we let him have. He wanted to tow it up to one of his pieces of land that takes 4 hours to drive, one way. He asked my neighbor to borrow a tow bar. My neighbor didn't have one but his friend did. They got it and it took them all morning and partly into the afternoon to hook up the van.

I don't know much about hooking them up but, I know that it shouldn't take that long! I happened to be at work this day which was good for Andrew because I would have killed him, lol! The was some issue about needing to drill holes in the van underneath it and unhooking this and securing that, etc......the thing wasn't meant to be towed with a tow bar, a tow dolly would have been much better, easier, and faster! That concept it foreign to Andrew!

Chuck wanted to leave in the morning but, because of Andrew, they didn't leave until 2:30 in the afternoon! Maybe even later! I know that Chuck didn't get home until 2:00 in the morning! He was so mad! Andrew wanted to go talk to a few people when they got there and Chuck had to put his foot down and say no! Chuck just wanted to get home.

Andrew put us through all of this just to save $43 at Uhaul. Yeah, $43 is all that a tow dolly would cost to rent! I know this because that is what we paid in January when we had to pick up my son's car. What a pain in the butt!

I had to work on Sunday also. Andrew never got his car towed to his trailer because he spent too much time messing around with the van. Andrew wanted to wait until late Sunday night and try to drive it. When I got home, I found Andrew on Dennis' computer. I looked at him and said, "You better not be putting any files on there!" He said he wasn't and then I decided to give him a piece of my mind. I had already told Chuck that I didn't want Andrew at our house and Chuck told him. I started saying, "you know...if I don't want you at me ******* house, then you better not come here! It's my house, not yours!" I got the usual sigh. I started saying that he put everyone out because of trying to save $43 ...me, Chuck, my mom (we borrowed her truck), and my neighbors! He got up and walked angrily into my kitchen, got himself some water and headed towards the door while saying that it wasn't that. I kept going on about how he was lazy and all he wants to do here is sit on his a** and watch TV and get on the computer, and only would work on his car when I was home!

I thought he was going out to his car to put things in it and get ready to go for later but, much to my surprise, he got in his car, started it right up and drove away. That car sat in my driveway for weeks, in the same condition, and he could have drove away with it earlier! I thought it would barely run! I guess it did overheat a couple of times on the way but he just pulled over, let it cool down some and drove again! Why didn't he do that 2 weeks earlier? It took me making him really mad, to get it out! How inconsiderate!

Then the icing on the cake........he wanted to come back the very next weekend. This time it was for guys night out. Some members from our church hang out at this one guy Brian's house. Brian lives only about 5 minutes away from me, so Andrew usually hangs out here before they go and comes here to stay the night after its over. It's almost always at Brian's because he is handicapped, and can't get out very easily. I told Chuck no way! Not going to happen! And I was right because guys night out was cancelled, lol!

Andrew hasn't been here since....Thank You, God!

Part 2: Andrew

Ok...we have known Andrew for about 12 years or more. He goes to our church so that's how we met him.

Andrew's parents divorced when he was young and he went to California to live with his dad (Andrew is an only child). When he was about 10 or so, his dad died and Andrew found him dead. He got shipped off to AZ to live with his mother and where TV raised him except Friday night from sundown to Saturday night sundown (the Sabbath). He was never aloud to spend the night at his friends houses, or ever aloud to date, and this continued until he was over 18. His mom is a musician that makes money by playing the piano for many different churches and at weddings. She doesn't make a ton of money so they try to be very frugal about everything they buy.

This family is so frugal that they go around picking up junk that people throw away in their junk piles to get rid of. They bring it home "in case" they could use it for something. This is so bad that they had so much stuff in their house that I would consider them hoarders. In fact, I just read about Compulsive Hoarding Syndrome, and it fits Andrew perfectly.... http://www.ocfoundation.org/hoarding/about-hoarding/compulsive-hoarding-syndrome-introduction.php. They did have little pathways through their house, the living room was so full of things, almost to the ceiling. Their carport was full of junk, along with the back yard. He doesn't work except on occasion to get a little cash. He is very smart with mechanical things, so he has helped us fix things for cheap.

About 5 years ago, his mother, Pat, met someone and about 2 years later, married him. They bought another house and he won't let her do her hoarding thing. Andrew lived with Pat for so many years and they had to tell him that he had to leave because they were going to fix up the house and rent it out. He was all upset and couldn't think about what to do. Someone gave him a trailer in a trailer park, but it is not in good condition and needs serious work done on it. He has to pay $250 per month for the lot it is on. He has some money because he has saved it his whole life on the jobs he's worked here and there. Since he had to leave his mom's house, he started taking his things over to his trailer and storing them there. He also has a bunch of things at my house that were only going to be there for a few months and have been there over 2 years now. Believe me, I have told him to take it several times but he keeps saying that he'll take some when he goes out to his trailer (it's about 45 minutes away from my house...maybe an hour at most).

He started seeing this one girl, Jessica, that has a 2 year old and 4 year old. He stayed with her for a couple of months before they both moved up to Prescott, AZ. He was there a couple of months before they broke up. He will watch her kids on the weekends for her so she doesn't have to pay for daycare then. Then he would come down here to do things and go to church. We would let him stay one or two nights here to save on gas. Then his car broke down. He fixed it once about a year ago but it broke down again. It has some serious issues going on in the engine. Since he's not aloud to work on vehicles at his trailer, Chuck told him that he could work on it at our house. We thought he'd be here for a couple days at a time and then go back to his trailer do do stuff there, since that's what he'd been talking about.

He started off by being here about 5 days at first. He didn't even look at his car for the first 3 days. He sat in the house watching TV. I said something to him "Andrew, I don't mind you staying here for one or two nights, as long as you're working on your car, but if this is just going to be a place that you come to flop to get away from Jessica, then NO! You have a trailer to do that at". He gave me some BS about how he's trying to figure out how to do certain things. I told him that he needed to start by lifting the hood of his car and looking at it. This went on for about 3 weeks and he only would do a little work on it every now and then. I then had another talk with him, that was longer and not sugar coated at all. I told him how he was making me mad and I wanted to see him working on it more than 30 minutes a day. I wanted him to work on it for at least 6 hours per day. All I get is a sigh and how he is working on it. I would call my kids when I was at work to see what he was doing and they would pretty much say that he was watching TV. I was getting so furious. Not only was he not doing what I asked him to do, but he also answer my phone, after telling him several times not to, and he never even asked us if he could stay until his car was done.

I would get up in the middle of the night (or early in the morning) and walk out to my kitchen for a drink and he'd be up watching TV! 3:00 in the morning and watching TV! Normally, this wouldn't bother me if someone was doing this, even him, if he wasn't supposed to be working on his car. I told him that 3:00 in the morning is a ridiculous time to be awake when he has to work on his car and I didn't want him sleeping in until Noon! I got a sigh again! I told him that he has no concept of time, that Chuck and I do because we have jobs and only have a day or two per week to get things done. Our time is precious because we have lots of things to do, and have kids. He doesn't get it!!!!!!!!!! I don't know how much more blunt I can be to him!

Oh, I forgot, in the meantime, his other vehicle broke down, so now I'm having to prod him on 2 vehicles. He finally got his van fixed but he took forever and he befriended my gear head neighbors and kept talking to them. I felt like I was living in Hell! He wouldn't leave or fix his vehicles...at least not in my time frame! I even told him it's my house, my rules! He didn't care! He finally fixed his van last Friday. Then Saturday, he did nothing but sit around all day. So Sunday, Chuck talked to him and told him that he had to leave. Since he decided NOT to fix his car and one of his vehicles was running now, it was time to go. He could come back this weekend to pick up the car and tow it away.

He was complaining to Chuck that I was being unreasonable and controlling! And how he was sleeping in an uncomfortable love seat, and how the kids would keep him awake. Then GO HOME! That's my answer to it all! How can my kids keep him awake when he was still awake at 3 in the AM? He didn't care that he was being an inconvenience to us on parking! Between all of our vehicles, we were having to park 9 vehicles! That's crazy! 2 of the vehicles were his, 3 are mine and Chuck's, 2 are my son's, one my daughter's and the last one was my son's friend's, Dennis, who stays with us too. We offered Andrew our van because it needs a new engine and we aren't going to fix it. He of course, will take it. So this weekend Chuck and Andrew are going to tow it up to some land that Andrew has.

He wanted to come here on Thursday and Chuck told him no, he can come on Friday. Then he wanted to go to church first on Saturday, then tow the van. His land is about 4 hours away, one way and he is slow. Chuck said no way...no church because he only has a limited amount of time to do that. They also have to tow Andrew's car to his trailer so that takes more time. He's driving us nuts!

I swear, there will be no more house guests! People have ruined it for others that might benefit from it. Let me rephrase that! Dennis can stay, he has a job! I also consider him like one of my own kids because he have practically raised him for the last 7 years or so.

So now, with the exception of Dennis, if you live at my house, you have to be related by blood or marriage...and even then, it questionable, lol!

Unruly House Guests!

Chuck and I are magnets to lazy people that just want to live off of someone! How do we always encounter such "friends"? Let me start off telling you about the oldest incident to the most current.

The first one was a couple named Jason and Melissa. This was years ago...when I first got pregnant with my 14 almost 15 year old daughter Amber. They lived with us for 3 months without working. Jason would work now and then for like one or two days, for his foster dad, painting. So he'd get a little pocket change, so to speak. I actually didn't work at that time either. My husband was the only one that worked. Chuck did not make a lot of money at that time. We could barely afford to pay our bills and I also had 2 other kids. I would have found a job but since I was pregnant, I didn't feel it was the right time to start looking. Jason and Melissa would eat our food and not contribute to replenishing it. Then we found hidden food stashed in the far back corner of one of my cabinets, with the dishes I rarely used. They bought the food and soda then hid it from us. So Chuck started drinking the soda, lol! After all, they had no problems eating our food.

I must admit, I started using them as babysitters since they couldn't seem to contribute any other way. I think they felt obligated, lol! That was only for a couple of weeks. They also used our car because theirs was broke down at the time. They said that they put gas in it but when we went to use it, it was almost on empty. I don't believe gas was ever put in there by them.

One time, I was doing laundry, and I always went out my bedroom door to the laundry room. We lived in an apartment at the time and I had to use the apartments washers and dryers. My bedroom had an arcadia door to my patio. The laundry facilities were behind my bedroom so it was easier to go out the back door than to go out the front and go all the way around the building. So, I'm on my last load of laundry, late at night, and they come home. I heard them talking but didn't think anything of it. So, I went out to get my last load and I smell something good, like some sort of hot food. I just happened to look down and, much to my surprise, there was a pizza from Streets of New York, and a veggie platter, on top of it. At first I thought "Who would put pizza on my patio" and no sooner did that thought go through my brain, I realized who would do it. I woke my husband up and told him what I found. We debated on bringing it in and eating it, but I figured they might smell it, lol! We also thought about taking it to the car and eating it but we were both too tired and weren't really hungry anyway.

So I just decided to go out and tell them that they could bring their pizza in and eat it. That Chuck and I weren't hungry so they didn't have to share it. Melissa tried saying that Jason's foster parents gave them their left over pizza. When I called her on it about it being a hot pizza, she said Joanna heated it up before they left. I told her that I wasn't stupid and I knew that they just got it, then turned around and went to my bedroom.

I could go on about this couple, but I have other ones to talk about.

Next came Garth. My husband went to school with him and he went to church with us from time to time. We knew him when he worked and had his own place. We just kept running in to him at different places, like the mall, a pizza place, walking down the street, etc...I noticed he was in the same outfit every single time we saw him. I also noticed that he didn't smell too good when we got close to him. I talked to my husband and told him to tell Garth that he could shower at our house if he wanted to. He was greatful, and went on his way, coming back the next day to visit. We felt sorry for him because we knew that this wasn't the Garth we were used to. We eventually offered him to stay with us. He took us up on the offer. He never would ask us for anything but when we offered him things, he took it. I waited a couple of weeks and he didn't even act like he was going to find a job. In my mind, I thought he was just down on his luck and became homeless. It's hard to find a job when you have no address, phone, and shower. So we provided him with all of that. And still, there was no motivation for job hunting. I was confused about it and didn't know how to approach the subject since he never even asked us for any help at all. Chuck and I were stumped as to how to handle everything.

When I finally asked him if he was out looking for a job, his response was "I've been thinking about it". A little more time went on and more questions came up with "I've been thinking about it" as an answer. I started noticing a pattern. Oh yeah, He was very religious too. Nothing wrong with that but he was practically the Holy Roller type. Just about all conversations with him would end up turning into a religious one. Way more than the average person. I spoke with one of the Social Workers at my job and after describing him to her, she told me that he sounded schizophrenic. There was nothing we could do about it because he was not a harm to himself or others.

Evntually, he ended up at another friends house and he had the job of getting him out. It was really tough and the police had to be called. Garth just would not leave, even when asked. That was 3 and a half years ago and we haven't seen him since.

Then came an old friend of mine name Billie Jean. Down on her luck with literally nowhere to go. Her daughter had to go live with one of her friends. So I let Billie Jean stay with us. Once again, things were fine at first and quickly went down hill. She used Chuck's car and would stay out so late (or early) that we didn't know if she was going to be here in time for Chuck to go to work at 5 am. She would say, Oh sorry, I fell asleep at so and so's house. So then we had to say that we want the car back by Midnight. So she did just that....most of the time.

This house guest, ate our food, used our water, electricity, and gasoline for the car, without replacing it. She brought her dog over too, a pit bull named Brownie. Brownie ate my dog's food, even when she had her own. Billie Jean just let her do it. I hated it because then Angel would have to go to Brownie's bowl and occasionally, a fight broke out. Angel is older than Brownie and has hip and knee problems too so I was afraid that she would get really hurt, but surprisingly, Angel usually ended up on top!

She got a job cleaning houses for a small company. After 3 weeks, she was fired. Then she got another job, after one week, she was fired. That's pretty bad. She always was the victim, of course. Then she decided to get a job as a maintenance person for an apartment complex so she could get free rent. No calls came, and she would call them, nothing! She kept trying, everyday. Still, nothing. I told her to go get a job anywhere, even if it were McDonalds, but she refused because "she couldn't live on that". I told her that something is better than nothing and since I was buying everything for her and her dog, that she need a job, even if it paid minimum wage. Then she used the excuse that she would have a hard time finding something else while working. Nice try...I didn't let her use that! I told her that she could use our computer, like she had been doing already, to put in applications. I also told her that people find other jobs all the time while working another one (well, maybe not in out economy now but at this time, they did). She just said, "well, I don't know how other people do it".

Then there were issues with her daughter Jessie. Jessie came to live with us during this time. Billie Jean let her 16 year old daughter go to kick backs, where all they do is listen to music, drink, and smoke pot. She said that it was better that she let her go and know where Jessie was than to have her sneak out like she did before and not know where she was. That is not how I raise my kids and I wouldn't tolerate that. I told her that I didn't like the way she was raising Jessie. I don't let my kids do that and I don't have any problems with my kids.

Jessie finally got a job at Peter Piper Pizza. Then someone (turns out to be a little girl) left their cell phone there. Jessie and her friend that worked with her, took it and brought it home. Jessie told me all about it and that the owner was trying to call and text the phone. I told her to answer it and tell her that she had it. No...that wasn't an option because Jessie and the friend were going to sell it. I told her that selling it was wrong because it wasn't hers to sell. After a few minutes, she left my house with the phone. I talked to Chuck about it and he said that we don't do stuff like that and that she has 2 choices. #1 was to give the phone back to the owner and #2 was to leave our house and would not be aloud to come back. When Jessie returned, I told her what we decided and a fight broke out with her. She called us every name in the book. We were being unreasonable. The phone was hers now because it's finders keepers. Billie Jean was nowhere that we could reach her. I ended up getting the cell phone and calling the owners. I gave it back to them 2 days later. I would have given it back sooner but they couldn't come get it before then. So after that, we were horrible people.

It still didn't make Billie Jean leave. I had to kick her out. I gave her 2 months warning that I was going to make her leave. She still didn't have a place to live or a job but after living with us off of us for 5 months, I couldn't take it anymore and didn't care if she had a job or not. It wasn't my problem, I had to make sure that my own family came first, then my sanity, lol!

So the most recent is Andrew. I'm going to leave this part of my blog to being a part 2. This blog is already long and Andrew's story will be long by itself so his will be the part 2 tomorrow. I have to tell about his background first before I tell about his story with us. I promise this story to you.

WHAT IN THE WORLD???

As I came home from my part time job today, I noticed something very strange down my street. Lots and lots of police cars, yellow tape, hovering helicopters, fire department, and many spectators! This was really weird! I thought "What in the world is going on?" At first I thought that a little kid may have drown is someone's pool.

I pulled in my driveway and walked out to the sidewalk to be one of the other nosy neighbors! I saw my neighbor to the West of me looking at everything and I asked him what happened. He said that a girl in the home was shot by her boyfriend and then shot himself. This house is only about 5 houses down from me and across the street. OMG! I couldn't believe it! I said "I have to call my friend Cheryl...she knows everything" (she lives only a few streets away from me). She gets a chance to watch the news more than I do so it sounded reasonable to me. When I called her, I found out that she didn't know what was going on yet, but heard all the helicopters hovering and fire trucks go by. So I told her what I had found out.

My street looked like a parking lot with all the cars on it. People were not able to drive up to their homes because a good portion of the street was blocked off. They were parking in front of my neighbors houses and walking home. The police were there until dark time and I came home around 1:20 in the afternoon.

This is so weird...especially since I went through this about a year ago or so with a girl I worked with. Her husband shot and killed her and then killed himself while their 4 young kids were home. This is so sad!

I just don't know why people get to the point where they feel that murder/suicide is the only option. I understand that people get depressed and may have chemical imbalances in their brain, but they make meds to help them. There is also counseling. Why don't some people utilize these? I guess I will never truely understand!

Life Laughs

I have recently been able to read a book by Jenny McCarthy titled Life Laughs. This is the only book I have read by her so far.

I found the book to be quite hilarious, having to put it down several times because I was laughing so hard that I had tears in my eyes! She talks about all kinds of things from her husband to sex. She even talks about her most embarrassing moments! She is real and to the point!

This book is certainly for adults only. She describes things in ways that I could never come up with in my wildest dreams, lol! You will also learn about "Jenny facts". This is too funny! Just a warning....she does use bad language. I personally don't have any problems with that.

I don't want to give any of it away because if someone wants to read the book, I'd hate to be the one that spoiled it! It is not for the faint of hearts! She does talk a lot about sex and gets very descriptive about it, so if that's not your thing....then don't even pick the book up!

Jenny did and awesome job in my opinion and I will probably read some of her other books in the future.

Beautiful AZ Sky-Wordless Wednesday

My daughter, Amber, took this picture outside our home a couple of weeks ago.

What are these kids thinking!

My youngest daughter, Amber, has a boyfriend named Kevin, who is in a "band". She goes to one of the boy's houses (Sam) every Tuesday and Thursday. The boys practice and Amber listens and takes pictures of them. I asked her if she was their groupie... but she says NO! She didn't find it as funny as I did for some reason.

Two of the boys have long hair and Kevin's is short but still a little long. They wear make-up on their face and remind me of the band Kiss but, without the white. The kids all look weird...even Amber. Lately, she has been wearing her make-up a bit thick and I have had to get after her for it. She also colors her hair...burgundy on top, and black on the bottom. Two of her friends cut her hair when she spent the night about a week ago. I came home and was like " WOW! What happened to your hair!" She said "Ashley and Bailey cut it...do you like it?" Um....NO! It needs fixed and I can do it but either I'm gone or she is so it hasn't been done yet. She reminds me of a mushroom, lol, but I didn't tell her that! The poor kid thinks she looks good! Now she has a lip ring! Thank God, it's not really pierced.

The ring is retractable but, she has some people at school thinking it's really pierced. My oldest son thinks I went crazy and let her pierce her lip. We haven't let him in on it yet! He was telling my sister that I let Amber pierce her lip, lol. He's so gullible...always has been.


I wish these kids well in their future of becoming famous but I don't like the make-up. I hope Amber grows out of her phase too!

Poker! Wordless Wednesday.

And that's all I have to say, lol!

Oh....I'm So Addicted!

I have been neglecting my blogging because of my new addiction! It has taken over my home life! It's all I can think about! It's called Facebook! I'm addicted to Facebook!

I first got on there to just see what it was. I wasn't too impressed at first but once I started reading all the flair, I just had to send my friend a bunch of it. It's all her fault anyway. She mentioned it and I just had to see what it was! I blame you! Lisa! LOL!!!!

At first I only had one friend......again.....Lisa! We sent little things back and forth using Superpoke! That is really cute! We also left each other little comments. Eventually I started looking for people I knew and old classmates. I started finding people, one by one. I even found someone I knew when I was 15. He was my ex's best friend when we were kids. I was very glad to get back in touch with him. We hadn't talked in years! There was and still is so much catching up to do! I just wish he still lived in AZ so he could come over and hang out with us. He and Chuck would get along great, probably ganging up on me!

Then the day came when I somehow was introduced to playing poker on FB. I don't even remember who's profile I stole the application from, lol. That's pathetic. I've never really played poker before this. Chuck playes on fulltiltpoker.net all the time. I only watch him, never playing! Then I got brave one day and tried it. Ever since then, I play everyday! I have lots of poker buddies and it only grows everyday. I'm getting better at the game. I also talk to people that are playing the game with me. At first I was shy. I wouldn't say anything, but then people would talk to me and I didn't want to be rude, so I would talk back. Now, I don't care who is talking to me. I like doing it!

Ok...there are days when I should be cleaning my house or doing laundry but it will always be there! I do clean but not as often as I used to! I really need to do it tomorrow so I am going to have to try and control myself until I'm done! I don't know if I can do it!

Does anyone know of a Facebook Annonymous (FA or FBA), lol? I may need it in the near future! I will try to blog more often than once every 2 week from now on, ok?

Taken

I have recently been able to preview the movie Taken, which comes out in theaters January 30th. It stars Liam Neeson as Bryan, a retired Government Spy.

His daughter,Kim, wants to go to Paris and he is completely against it. After a while, he softens and allows her to go. Once there, she and her friend were taken by the Albanian mafia/criminal organization. Given his knowledge from his line of work, he knows that he only has 96 hours to find Kim, before she could disappear forever. The rest of the movie he spends searching for her and coming up with some pretty interesting ways to get people to talk.

I am leaving out a ton of details on purpose, as to not spoil the movie for anyone that may want to see it. It does have lots of violence (wouldn't you kick butt if your child was taken), sexual content (but not in the regular couple kind of way), and drug references. I do not recommend taking children to this movie.

This movie held my attention the whole time. I thought it would be one of those movies that is good but I would want to fall asleep in 3/4 of the way through (as I sometimes do...especially if I'm watching a movie at home). It was not that way for me. I stared at the screen the whole time, not even eating any snacks or drinking anything. It was one of those movies that I didn't want to end instead of one to where I'm looking at the time, wishing it had been more than 5 or 10 minutes longer than the last time I checked.

Liam Neeson did an excellent job and I hope he wins an award for this movie. If you have a chance to go to the movies, skip the chick flick and go see this movie. In my opinion, it was GREAT!

What The???? Again!!!!!!

I love my husband dearly but, the man needs help! I'm always threatening him that I'm going to put him in a home (and not ours)! I'm always finding things in strange places! He put the Miracle Whip away in the cabinet next to the bread. I think it says refrigerate after opening somewhere on it. The other thing...is that he didn't even put the bread in the right spot! The bread goes in a different cabinet, right next to the loaf that hasn't been opened yet! So if he didn't know where it went, all he had to do is find the other loaf!

I have found lunch meat in the cabinet, peanut butter in the fridge, butter in the cabinet, and my pots and pans always have a new home after he puts the dishes away! Does he seriously have mental problems or does he not pay attention? I think it's both. He is bi-polar so he's on meds and he does take pills to help him sleep. He did eat sandwiches after he took his meds. So which is it? Sometimes he drives me crazy with all his forgetfulness.

I've tried everything I can think of to help him, short of leaving little post-it notes all around the house, which, by the way, he would ignore! Should I be frustrated, sympathetic, or just treat every day as a seek and find day? I give up! I've had to throw food away because he put it in the cabinet instead of the fridge, and it sat there all night and the majority of the next day.

This is not all he does! He always "forgets" to do things I ask him to do. His tools (big tool boxes), will sit in the house for weeks. I ask him to put them away and he says he'll do it, but he won't. He says "I forgot"! I'm starting to think he has Alzheimer's, mad cow, or it's just plain defiance! It's so frustrating. I will even hide them from him! Nothing works! OK, he will put things away once I get mad and blow up at him! When I tell him that he put the Miracle Whip in the cabinet, he'll probably laugh and say, 'At least I put it away'! Arrrrrrg!

In his defense, I will have to say that he doesn't ruin food everyday. It happens about once a month!

Great Big Kiss: WW

Amber's pet snake, Milfrid! A Joy to have around..... NOT! Yes, that is Milfrid's tongue sticking out! Yes, she spells his name M-I-L-F-R-I-D, not M-I-L-F-R-E-D! The child is strange!

The Rescue!

Eric's friend, Dennis, who is almost like my own child because we have let him live with us on and off for about the last 6 years, decided to go to New Mexico last weekend. His mom has a house there, though she is not there too often due to reasons I won't mention at this time. He followed his dad there so they could get some of their things, and then they were going to come back to Phoenix on Monday. Well Monday came and went and Dennis was supposed to show up for work at 9 AM on Tuesday but, never made it. We started to get worried because it's not like him to not show up when he says. His cell phone is broken and there is no house phone so we had no way to call him to see if he was OK.
Eric, his friend Steven, and Steven's 2 roommates decided to take a road trip to see if Dennis was alright. They left my house about 8:30 PM, in Eric's car, and set out on their journey. I was on the computer for several hours, as time gets away from me, and at about 12:30 thought that I'd better get to bed since I have to be at work at 7:00 AM. Just as I was about to go to bed, I get a call about 12:45. "Mom, my car overheated. Where are you? I'm almost in Wilcox. Is anything around you? No, just freeway and dirt. We stopped at Wal-Mart a ways back and bought anti-freeze. I put it in my car and drove about 3 miles and it overheated again. Oh, there's no radiator cap. Let me talk to dad and I'll call you back". After talking with my husband, we decided that we would both take the day off work and go rescue these kids. Chuck loaded up the car with a bunch of tools, jugs of water and a light that clips onto the battery...sort of like jumper cables. I loaded up drinking water and other random things I thought we might need. On our way, we stopped at a 24 hour Auto Zone and bought a radiator cap. We headed out, I was driving because Chuck has to take meds to help him sleep, and occasionally Eric would call me to see how far we were but we didn't talk long as his battery was about to die. It took us about 3 1/2 hours to get to them. Eric told me he exited at mile marker 303, then got back on the freeway, and drove about 3 more miles. NOT! He drove 9 more miles.
Here is a picture of Eric's stranded car and Chuck talking with the boys on the side of the car.














He tried so hard to figure out where the car was leaking water from. He checked all the hoses and saw nothing. He looked at the radiator and also saw nothing. It was very cold out (well, I thought so anyway) and I had drank water and soda... so, of course, I was trying to hurry them up so we could find the next rest stop. Chuck finally felt sorry for me and said that we could find the rest stop and then come back. So that's what we did. As it turns out, the rest stop was only about 1 1/2 miles away, Thank God!

Chuck ended up driving the car to the rest stop long enough for it to cool down and for us to figure out our next move. The kids were starving so we decided to drive back to the last town and find a place to eat. We all walked in to Denny's looking like something the cat dragged in at 6:30 AM. We ate and Chuck had to take his millionth cup of coffee to go (OK, I exaggerated a bit). I had to call home to make sure the other kids were up for school. Then off we went to get the car.

We decided to take it to the town of Benson, where Denny's is. There it sits at a motel until this weekend when Chuck and I will make another trip to retrieve it. We will be borrowing my mom's truck and renting a tow dolly.

Now we had to get everyone home with 5 seats in my car and 6 people. The only thing we could do was to have someone sit on a lap. The 2 room mates were dating so she sat on his lap. I felt sorry for them but it was better than being stranded. We were all extreamly tired...well, except Chuck and all his coffee in him, plus he was the only one that had any sleep before we left. I just had to take pictures of the kids sleeping and all cramped in the back seat. Do you think this looks comfy? The first picture looks like Eric's straw is about to go up his nose! Sitting next to him is Steven, then the other 2 with the girl being the one in the green (sorry, I can't remember their names).




Her head was on the back of my headrest. She is wearing the hood to the jacket so you can't see her face. The boy is just behind her. You can see his hat and Steven is resting his head on the boys shoulder.

We all got home safe and very tired. I think the poor kid's legs went numb!

As for Dennis, he was at his mom's house. I actually got a hold of him while the kids were on their way. His dad's Explorer broke down and Dennis was waiting for him to get it fixed.

I had a talk with Dennis so he now knows that he can call me collect from a pay phone if plans change!

January In AZ

This was taken with my 1.3 mp cell phone camera so the quality isn't that good, not to mention I was in my car and my husband was driving. This is around Casa Grande, AZ.

Out with the old, In with the new!

This past weekend my husband and I (mostly Chuck) replaced our water heater! I didn't know how bad the old one was until we pulled it out! Take a look at this! So gross! The top picture is of the lower heating element. It is so rusted that it is almost unrecognizable.
The lower picture is of the bottom of the water heater...again, all rusted out. I also took a picture of the upper heating element pulled out. It was too blurry and I got sidetracked so I didn't get a chance to take another one. It looked like something that has been on the bottom of the ocean for 100 years.

Since the spigot was all messed up, we were unable to drain it before we took it out. A 50 gallon water heater is very heavy, especially when full of water. It took Chuck, Eric, me, and a dolly to get it out the door that was, thankfully, right next to it. Then we pushed it over and let the water drain in the yard.

Next, was to install the new one. After our ritual of going to The Home Depot to get some things we needed ($45 later), the installation began. Chuck had to do some re-wiring because the new water heater is much shorter than the old one (it's still 50 gallons, just fatter). He put on the new pipes and wires. He then decide to have Rachael turn on the kitchen hot water before he finished attaching the top part of the copper pipe (don't ask why...I don't think he even knows). Water sprayed everywhere!!!! Caught us both off guard but we thought it was funny. Please keep in mind that this is the first water heater he has ever replaced in his life. He is not a plumber! Overall, he did a great job. We now have steaming hot water and I don't have to adjust my water temp in the shower every 2 minutes!

So here is the finished work. I am very greatful that Chuck can fix things.

What A Shame

I am a Young and the Restless junkie! I have watched it for about 24 years now. I stopped watching it on TV for a couple of reasons. I like to watch it at a more convenient time for me and watching it on cbs.com cuts out a lot of commercials!

On the page that you watch it, towards the bottom, there is a place where viewers can leave comments. Most people leave it anonymously but some log in and their user name shows up. We all act like we have no lives and talk about the show/characters as if they are real. There is at least one, maybe more, person(s) that can't ever say anything about the show. All they do is say racist comments/jokes and they make a bunch of people mad! It drives me crazy every time I see one of their posts! I have reported it several times but nothing is done. I don't think they have people reviewing the comments. I wish you had to log in to leave any comment so that way it can be traced back to who is doing it. There is another section (Fans/Forums) that you do have to be logged in to leave any comment so why doesn't one have to be logged in at the other area?

I don't want to read or hear about anything racist! We all don't have a choice as to what skin color we are born with or what country we are born in. Pretty much everything else, we have a choice on and that includes how nice or mean you can be to someone!

I, on the other hand, am prejudice against people who do bad things like steal from hard working people that may have worked a ton of overtime just to afford something they needed, or people who kill (I don't mean in self defense) and have no remorse about it, like a lot of gang members. I don't care what your skin color is, if you do things like that, I have no respect for you. It's all about actions!

So when people act like that, all I think is... What A Shame!

It's My Birthday! And Other Things!

Yes, today is the day! It was a pretty nice day for the most part. My mom came by and took me out for Mexican food at Garcia's! I love Mexican food! We had a nice day together. My friends and family gave me cards, text messages, emails, ecards, and phone calls! That was nice of everyone. I normally work on my Birthday but I got it off this year, not because it was my Birthday, but because my schedule worked out that way!

The down side was when I had my daily headache! It is gone now. The nap I took may have helped, along with all the Ibuprofen, LOL! I get headaches everyday, there are a few reasons why I think they happen. I have a tooth that needs a root canal and it causes pain that shoots up into my head. I can't afford to get it fixed. Even with dental insurance, it's still a few hundred dollars because I need a crown too! Also another reason may be that I need glasses! I've been putting that off for a couple of years but I think I need to break down and get some. I don't look good in them and I will want contacts instead.

The other thing I did today was purchase a new water heater! Our house was built in 1976 and we still had the original one! The last 2 months, our showers have had to be quick. The hot water only lasts for about one shower. About a week ago, Chuck looked at our water heater and thought that it just needed a new heating element. It did because one of them was just hanging down, broken. After trying to drain the water out so he could take out the element, he discovered 2 more problems. The first one being that the water spigot would not drain any water out. He took it off only to find the other problem. There was so much sediment that when he shoved a wire hanger in it, it felt almost like he was shoving it in to sand. Eeewww! Gross! He put everything back until we could get a new water heater. Today was the day because I had the time (and I really want a shower that I don't have to adjust the temp every 2 minutes). So guess what we will be doing this weekend!

I have so many other projects to do in my house! We had a leak in my roof and water was coming in through my ceiling. Chuck fixed the leak over the summer but now we have to fix the drywall and along with that, take down more popcorn off the ceiling. Not a hard job, as we have done it before, but very messy! Along with that come texturing the ceiling and painting, I will be ripping out some carpet this month, long story but it's mostly because of cats, I'd like to take off all the shower tiles and redo them (I think the greenboard needs replaced too) in both bathrooms (it gets moldy easy), and then a few other things. Oh the joys responsibilities of being a home owner!

"Old" Approaching

My 38th birthday is tomorrow and I'm getting the "Old" jokes! My friends, co-workers, and children all have made some sort of remark. I don't really mind because either they are already there or will be soon! My husband doesn't say anything, that's because he is the "old" one, LOL! He will be 40 on the 17th.

My son, Eric, makes comments year round. "Mom, back in the Stone Age, did they have.......?" or he makes jokes about all there was when I was little were rocks. He thinks he is so funny! I had my son when I was 17 and all of his friends parents are older than me except Steven's mom. I went to school with her since 6th grade, all through high school (although we were never friends). She is less than a year younger than me (maybe 6-8 months) but Steven is about a year and a half younger than Eric. So does that make me old? I'm sure my mom won't say I'm old because that makes her "older". My sister is old (almost 44), but not me, LOL!!!

I'm really only joking about all the above. Some days I feel old and others I do not. At what age do we become old? When I was little, I used to think 21 was old. Then when I turned 21, I found out that I was wrong. It was 35. Wrong again! Now I just know it's way off.

My husband tells me that age is just a state of mind. I actually believe that because he acts like a kid, a lot! I call him my 5th kid or my oldest kid! He will agree with me (sometimes). I won't take him to Toys R Us anymore!!! I can't seem to get him out of there, LOL!

At what age do you think we turn old?

Photo Radar

Here in AZ we have photo radar cameras. There are 2 cameras per "speed trap". One is set to take a picture of your face and the other is set to take a picture of your license plate. Then the courts run your plate and send you a ticket along with a picture of your face and license plate. I've seen pictures of people and it is very clear. There is no doubt about who is driving.

There is some problems that have come with this:

1. Stolen plates

A. The courts have you provide the police report number, so they have that all worked out.

2. Selling the vehicle

A. They want you to provide the information of the person the vehicle was sold to.

3. Loaning your vehicle out to a friend or family member

A. They also want the information of the person driving

Several years ago, when this started getting popular, all you had to do was take the picture into court and say "That's not me" then they would throw it out. Now they have wised up to that (probably losing too much money) and they send you the picture along with a ticket and a place to identify the driver. The information they are asking is the person's name, address, DL #, expiration, state of DL, and DOB. Then it says "I declare under penalty of perjury that the information provided herein is true and correct to the best of my knowledge". Then there is a place to sign your name, print and date. However there is nowhere to make any comments.

I'm sure you can tell, by the details given, I have received one of these lovely things in the mail. No, it wasn't me driving. Chuck loaned his car (which is in my name) to a friend of ours and he got his picture taken on the freeway doing 75 in a 65. The camera is set to start taking pictures at 10 mph over the speed limit and that's exactly what he was doing. 1 mph less and I would not be blogging about this.....yet, LOL!

So here's the problem. The friend that was driving, "Andrew", doesn't want the ticket, I guess. I know his first and last name but that's it! I know his last known address but he has recently moved to Prescott. Now I have no idea what it is. I also don't typically ask friends for their DL# before they borrow our car. Has it come down to that, asking your friends for their DL#? Do we need to keep them in our address book, or should we just make a photo copy of their license before they drive our car?

Andrew has Pre-paid Legal and called them about the situation. According to Andrew, they say that Chuck and I are under no obligation to pay for it. Andrew wants us to hold off on it and wait and see what comes of it, then we'll deal with it then. I say NO WAY! I will give him up no matter what! We had another friend that got one and he ignored it and a process server showed up at his door and handed him the ticket! The courts will not let it go. I personally don't want to be held accountable for a violation I did not commit! I do not want a warrent out for my arrest for not cooperating and/or paying for something I didn't do.

We are going to tell him that we want his information and then the courts can send him the ticket and then he can deal with his Pre-paid Legal service after he gets the ticket. I won't say that I don't know who it is. The pictures are clear, however his picture was taken at night and the bottom half of his face was dark, but I still know who it is. During the daylight hours, it's perfect.

OK, he happened to call us while I was typing this. He still doesn't want us to do anything yet. I gave him the website so he can see it and the lawyer can look at it too. He will be down on Monday and call the lawyer...again! I told him I will hold off on doing anything until then, since the information doesn't have to be in until the 27th. I also felt that he should at least have the right to view the ticket that he's being accused of. I also let him know that I will not "Take one for the team" so to speak! Chuck feels that if he wants to take on "The Man", he shouldn't do it at his friends expense. He should wait until he is the only one involved.

Once everything is figured out, I will post an update.

If you are interested in what this is all about and how it works, go to:

www.azdps.gov/photoenforcement

Happy New Year!

I hope everyone had a safe New Year celebration!
I was boring and was on my computer at the time the New Year came! I did not drink because I had to work New Years Day! My husband was also on the computer in my bedroom, I was on my laptop sitting on my bed and my youngest son was laying on my bed watching 'Merry Christmas Drake and Josh'. OK...I was sort of watching it too! I can't help it, I like that show! I guess we had some great family bonding since we were in the same room and all, LOL! My oldest son and his friend were home, Rachael spent the night at her friend's house and Amber went to her boyfriend's mom's friends house. I spoke with Kevin's mom before she went and made it clear that if she drank anything, I will be more than happy to pick Amber up. She assured me that she doesn't take any chances, especially when she has kids with her. Amber came home safe about 2:00 AM. I still haven't seen Rachael yet. Since she graduated High School (and has her own car), we don't see each other much. She goes to a Community College and works part-time. The rest of the time she is with her friends or boyfriend and I am at work a lot!

Since I am still new to this blogging, I haven't had time to put pictures on here but I will soon! Don't know of what yet. I hate getting pictures taken of me! I need to lose some weight first! That will be happening soon since the Holidays are over now! I will post when I start and if I actually lose any or not (hopefully this will keep me motivated). I've done it before and was feeling pretty good but, I started having major foot pain and some other issues so I had to quit going on my nightly walks. Hopefully it won't happen again! I really like my walks because it's peaceful and helps me think more clear!