they drink human urine, you know

meep meep,
originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

this is a sad story. but, not to sound like a know-it-all because i really don't know that much about it, but i have know about the diminishing number of pikas since 2001, while working in americorps. in july of 2001 i had the unique experience of working on mount harvard at an altitude of 14,420 feet to help build trails for hikers. it was one of the most difficult experienes of my life. but that's completely irrelevant to this post.

at the top of the mountain were two types of animals, pikas and marmots. pikas are extremely rare and are only found at the tops of mountains, as the cnn article states. i was told by our site leader that not many people have studied them but we know that with the increasing temperatures, the very delicate tundra of high mountains are diminishing, causing a decline in both animals.

as a side note, those of you who know my embarrassing story about being incredibly ill on the mountian and being "meep meeped" at by small animals who wanted to eat my urine...this was one such animal.

while i'm blogging

i thought i might add this quote, which is taken from donald wood's book biko.

"there exists amongst men, because they are men, a solidarity through which each shares responsibility for every injustice and every wrong committed in the world and especially for crimes that are committed in his presence or of which he cannot be ignorant. if i do not do whatever i can to prevent them, i am an accomplice in them. if i have not risked my life in order to prevent the murder of other men, if i have stood silent, i feel guilty in a sense that cannot in any adequate fashion be understood juridically or politically or morally...that i am still alive after such things have been done weighs on me as a guilt that cannot be expiated.

"somwhere in the heart of human relations, an absolute command imposes itself; in case of criminal attack or of living conditions that threaten physical being, accept life for all together or not at all."

donald is of course talking about apartheid in south africa and the call for all people (white, black and other) to not just talk about the evils of the separate state, but to act as well. and the words are actually attributed to karl jaspers. but i thought these words really summarized my feelings and are a great answer to the question people often ask of me and chris, "why go to africa?"

v'burg visit

for all those wondering, our mississippi trip was very pleasant. i am sure that chris will post about it more. he actually wanted to post tonight, but seeing that he's passed out on the chair at the moment, i thought i'd link these pictures from fuzzy.

thanks for the gift cards!

you all will be happy to know that our camera issue has been resolved. no, we did not find the old camera that walked away (wouldn't that have been nice!?). today we purchased a new camera, thanks in part to gift cards and christmas/birthday money. we decided on a different camera, one with a higher zoom and greater megapixels. i think i just couldn't buy the one we had before because it would seem like a step back and that was just more depressing. so hopefully this little buddy will be a good investment. and i'm not taking it to work this time!

cats and presents

well, my parents beat me to it. but happy birthday hubby! it will be full of cats and presents, for what more could you ask?

as you, dear readers may want to know, chris and i made it to mississippi in record time and it was probably the easiest trip we've made thus far, except we got a crack in our windshield about 10 miles from our destination and we're taking our car in the AM to have the tired checked out b/c it's making a strange "thump-thump" sound.

other than that, on a complete tangent, we've heard from catholic relief services. they wanted to schedule a "telephone conversation" today. but we are unable to accommodate because we're picking up chris's sister at the airport at the exact time they wanted to chat. so we're hoping to reschedule for early january. will keep you posted as we know more. very exciting!

a carolin' means christmas

last night a select few of us (some of my favorites, in fact) from our YACS! (Young Adult CatholicS) group went christmas caroling at an independant living facility. i have to say, i was a little nervous about just going out and caroling. you just never know the reception you're going to get. and, hey, i'll admit it, sometimes retirement facilitites are depressing. plus, our group had no "formal training," persey, and i wasn't sure i wanted to go make a fool of ourselves (though i guess the hard-of-hearing are a good group to do that in front of).

in any event, it turned out surprisingly well. chris and i both agreed that it was a great time. i hadn't sung carols since i was a kid in the choir. it was really...well...christmasy. not to mention the fact that the residents loved us (even the jewish woman with the hanukka sign on her door requested "we wish you a merry christmas)." it was just so sweet. one touching moment was when a woman called us into her apt (we were singing up and down the halls). she said she was the resident's nurse and that she had "been critical" for the past few days. the nurse had stayed with her night and day and was just trying to get her to hold on. she said that she wanted to give the resident some sort of feeling of christmas but couldn't figure out how since she couldn't leave her bed. so we went into the woman's bedroom and sang 3-4 songs for her while the nurse sat in the living room crying. really touching. i guess this goes to show what i have always believed but don't often practice: it's always important to step outside your comfort zone. you don't know what you'll find, but it's often something life-altering.

on with the festivities

so the party on saturday went off with nary a hitch (with the exception of a few medium-sized children running wild in our house for the first half of the night, no biggy). we estimate we had about 40 people over throughout the course of the night. not the masses we had anticipated based on previous experience. but that's a solid number and keeps the choas in a bit of order. though now we have lots of food and cider left over which we'll dispose of tonight when we go caroling with friends. you can read one review of the event here.

today is jim's birthday. so i should say, "HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BO!" sorry we're not there to go to the movies with you. but in honor of your birthday, i'm giving blood this afternoon.

the joy of the season...

is knowing that it's 1:00 PM on friday and i don't have to be into work for another 426 1/2 hours (that's just over 2 weeks folks, keep up!). that's just fabulous. if i weren't so drained i'd be a bit more overtly enthusiastic. but do not be fooled, i'm ecstatic.

so, what do i plan to do? rest? not yet. big party tomorrow. so for now more cooking and cleaning and sprucin' up the joint. party. then rest. maybe sneak a movie (king kong) in there too.

on a side note, if i had a camera (which you all may remember , i don't), i'd take a picture of the cutest wreath that i made. my first attempt. hurt like crap to put together, thanks pointy evergreen!, but it's cute!

i am thinking

i should blog something. but i'm too tired.

*horray for amy for graduating by the way! we'll miss you.

the lion, the witch and tito puente

this weekend has been chock full o' movie-going and cookie-making, both of which are obvious signs of the holidays for me.

friday night i saw pride and prejudice (i know. i know. p&p on the opening weekend of narnia! don't worry, read on.) with the ladies and was honored to be invited into "the nightcap club," a club of whose existance i had no previous knowledge. basically i was the recipient of a hand-made nightcap like they wore in the "olden days." thanks mag, i shall wear it with pride!

saturday i spent making cookings and other goodies for our upcoming shindig and other various holiday obligations.

then today, sunday, we went to the much-anticipated narnia. i'm sure chris will give a full review in due time. i'm not really a "review-giving" kind of person. but i'll just say it was fabulous. it's been years since i read the book so i really didn't recall the nitty-gritty of the story line; so i have no clue where they deviated from the book. but the acting was great, animation amazing, music fabulous, and i was totally pleased. but that whole good vs. evil thing gets me every time.

the rest of the day--you guessed it--more cookie making. but as chris and i decorated our cute, cute, cute cut out sugar cookies, we rocked out to tito puente.

friday afternoon musings

i am breathing a sigh of relief as my week from hell is over. i can't say the week got worse but it certainly didn't get any better.

i am comforted by the thought that i have only one more week left and then 2 weeks off. so right now i plan to curl up on the couch and watch one of my two comfort movies, i haven't decided yet which one (and those who know me well will know the choices), as i make christmas cards.

if this week were a jeopardy category...

it'd be "week from hell" for $1000.

my week was already going to be hectic enough, what with a few more potlucks (2 in one day), the conclusion of the big program i run at work, as well as the preparation for graduation and various other end-of-the-year rushy-rush-rush stuff. but add to that the fact that my (our) digital camera has disappeared ("taken" perhaps by someone at work), my nice bracelet (yes, the one chris gave me for our wedding) broke, my ink cartrige is out (bad time of year to try and get another one from the school supply lady), and oh...what else can i heap on there?? that seems like enough for now. it seems like every day has had a minor disaster that makes it really difficult to clear my already full plate.

the bright side (because there always has to be one): i'm done my christmas shopping, i have all the parts to the bracelet to fix it, and i'm not working another 12 hour day this week. i'll make it through, (dramatic sigh goes here).

(p.s. hope you're having fun in florida, mom and jim. jerks!

holiday-friendly shopping

chris and i ventured out today and took advantage of some holiday shopping. we first went to the "normal" haunts that most folks go to (target, bed bath and beyond, and other large box stores). then we stopped by columbia's new ten thousand villages store. it was so great. we loved every thing in the store. i wish i had gone there before buying most of my presents already!

so i thought i'd spread the word and tell folks to shop there online. support fair trade and artisan crafts. (of course there are lots of other cool places to shop fair trade as well, this is just one.)

delayed

snooz-fest.,
originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

Yup, this pretty much sums up most people's Thanksgivings, I think. Eltriptophan-induced sleep. Except that doesn't explain why I pass the heck out after one* of our meals.

In any event, it wasn't all sleeping, I'll have you know. There was plenty of walks on the beach, eating, playing with the kids, eating, early christmas present-opening, and dog shenanigans. Click on the image or here to see the picts of our weekend of fun.

(Thanks Waldies for the good times. Always great to see you and catch up. Thanks mom and jim for the hospitality and food and you know...everything.)

*The dinners were all were so delicious and I ate too much at all of them so i can't remember which meal it was that I passed out, Thanksgiving or another one.

more is less with peace corps

quick update on peace corps just to let you know that we don't know. our regional recruiter called today basically to say that nothing will happen with our application until february of 2006. i am not really sure how that differs from what she originally told us nor do i know what that means in the grand scheme of things. but that's what we now know--february.

in february the folks in washington, dc, will sit down and look at all the couples who have applied. based on our experiences and the projects available the pc people will pick who they think would be a good fit for each project. when i was on the phone with the recruiter she was leading me to believe that this was a setback. but now that i'm thinking more about it i'm realizing that it is right on the path of what we read and heard.

but regardless, in february we will hopefully know at least whether or not we will be moving forward.

how do veggies spend thanksgiving?

vegetarians often get weird quesions at thanksgiving. it's ok, we're used to it. so to answer the age-old question, what do you DO without meat (because what IS thanksgiving without a dead bird on your dinner table)? check out this website to find out what we do to replace the void in our dinner.

thanks, kaiser for the link:)

test failure

i tried to send myself a blog posting using my email address from work this morning. but, because you do not see the post here you know it failed. oh well. but i know why! i had the wrong address. duh.

in any event, the post was pretty much this.
i'd be crabby because it's a monday, it's rainy and i'm note feeling too hot. but it's a 2 day work week (now with 1 day down), our heat (finally!) kicked on last night, and i went to bed at 9:30. so i actually don't feel so bad today!

peace corps interview

that was a painless interview. i was wrong though, our recruiter didn't forget about us. but, like last time, she called and asked for 15 more minutes to look over our file. in any event, we still really don't know anything. she's as vague as you'd expect from the government. so she told us *again* that it's a "different process for couples" "i have to speak my coordinator and see what to do next" "you have to be flexible" "there's a different process for couples" "it may take a little longer" "there's a different process for couples".

sooooo, if you ask what we've heard from peace corps we'll say....

you guessed it folks, "it may take a little longer, it's a different process for couples."

ttickets in hand. ready to go

for harry potter of course. not for the carolina clemson game that i keep hearing about even though i couldn't care less. though i guess i should care if it's in columbia or not b/c the traffic is always a pain (anyone in cola can you fill me in on that?).

back to HP. about 100 pages to read before 6:00 tonight. i've been trying to breeze through the book again in time for the movie. that's why i've been mia on the posting this week. sorry folks.

and we should be getting a call any second now from our peace corps recruiter to do our couples interview. she's 4 1/2 minutes late already. wouldn't be surprised if she forgot about it. more on that later.

el negativo

today was just one of those days where everything was either totally negative or misunderstood as wrong. i spent a large part of my day writing a negative recommendation, if that makes sense. i had to write a document about how this guy stinks at his job and is not holding up his end of the bargain. what a waste of energy! and then the rest of the day i was defending myself for something that i was instructed to do. mondays, bah!

BTW

i know i spelled "hardqore" wrong in my previous post. if you really want to know, it's an insider reference about a friend who was so HQ he ate one egg for every day of month for a whole month (as in 1 egg on the 1st, 2 eggs on the 2nd...you get it).

paint the world in technology

ok, so i was supposed to get off work at noon today. but there was a little painting project going on at one of my schools and i just couldn't resist joining in. this particular school is under construction resulting in part of our campus being cordoned off by particle board barriers. the 2 magnificent art teachers decided to paint murals along the walls of the construction to prevent students from tagging them with their own artwork. various teachers and volunteers were painting all day today but there is just so much to do that they really weren't making any headway. and it was a beautiful day in sunny south carolina, so instead of leaving at noon i decided to stay and help.

while painting i was engaged in conversation with one of my coworkers and she was talking about her husband who works in 4 richland two high schools as a german teacher. he uses distance education to teach his classes. the classrooms are all hooked up with computer systems that are networked to a distant location and then the teacher teaches the students through a system of video conferencing. now i know this is nothing relatively new, they did it in college. but i just thought it was so amazing that they're doing this on the high school level. and i started thinking, why don't people do this in developing countries to help rural schools get teachers?

now let me say that i know someone must be doing this already. and i'm sure it's not as simple as i'm making it. but "they" say that technology is what is going to bring the 3rd world out of poverty.

so i'm just saying...i'm going to look into this...

hardqore fightin'

tonight i got a butty-kicking by my husband. no! not a real butty-kicking. in mortal combat shaolin monks on the XBOX. erica and fuzzy sent it to us for free (thanks guys!) about a month ago because their now ex-roommate is the producer. but until tonight we've not even had time to unwrap it. but this evening i was able to distract chris for a few minutes to kick my butt. but then after about 15 minutes i got bored (typical me) and left chris in there for another 1/2 hour while he played alone (typical him). so now i can hear the sounds of butt-kicking coming from the back but i don't know whose butt is being kicked this time.

i'm rerun

if you had asked me to name all the peanuts characters (like the ladies did last night during outburst) i wouldn't have thought of rerun. which makes sense considering this character type is-what is it?- "often overlooked by people." i don't know if i'm always rerun, but lately i've been a little down in the dumps so i'll say it's true right now.


Which Peanuts Character are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

my part?

in the wake (pardon the pun) of the newest disaster, i've been utterly horrified at how helpless i've felt to do anything. every day i've heard the numbers of the dead rise and rise and rise, now reaching upwards of 73,000 and knowing the numbers will get bigger as the himalayan winter approaches.

so thanks to a recent dog walking job (and thanks mag for passing it on to me) i've been able to send a little money. i know they say that if everyone gave a few bucks the people in need would be able to get shelter and escape some of the most harshest circumstances. but i can't help but wish i could do more. but for now i suppose this'll have to do.

it represents my personality

"it" meaning hot tomales, of course. that's what a 6th grader said to my coworker, ami, yesterday when she commented on how much he liked hot tomales. it was one of the wittiest lines i'd heard in a while. it just hit my funny bone because here's this awkward little white boy and he says hot tomales represent his personality! hilarious!

all this happened at a middle school dance, mind you. i made a booth with a guessing game and candy as a prize. it was actually more fun than i was expecting. i hadn't been to a middle school dance since...well, i was in middle school. and i was not particularly fond of them at that time. but i found it mildly amusing to be at the dance, of course compounded with feelings of compassion for the kids who were there because you know there's always drama at a middle school dance. heck, what am i saying? everything's drama in middle school period. but anyways, yea, good times. and hot tomales apparently are the new craze.

a swing and a hit

today was my first go at eucharistic ministering at st. thomas more. i found myself oddly nervous. i was thinking that because i'd done it like a bazillion times at my old church, i'd feel like an old hat. but i really was afraid i'd make a mistake. probably i was intimidated because i was worried that everyone in the church would be looking at me like, hey, who's the new EM?

but anyways, it went off without a hitch. i really enjoyed it. what i liked most which i don't remember thinking about before, was that i got to really connect with about 1/2 the people in the church. i looked them in the eye and then, as i placed the eucharist in their hands, i generally touched their hand (or their tongue for the one lady! oops!). it just felt like i was bringing the community closer to me and i really liked that feeling.

i'm up at bat again at 8:00 AM this tuesday, as it's all saint's day (a holy day of obligation, if you pay attention to that stuff).

catching up

this weekend chris and i teamed up with tricia and adam to drive up to asheville to visit michelle. it was a fun-filled weekend which include delicious home cookin' (thanks michelle and scott for the great meal!), a shortish hike in bad shoes, wonderful restaurants, a random high schooler swimming in the city fountain, my cousin hannah, a brisk view of the clouds surrounding craggy gardens, and good conversation with good friends, just to name a few.

thanks guys for the good times.

p.s. to michelle, i'd have featured a solo picture of you but i don't have a picture of you alone, so i hope this'll do;)

a year in the life

dara brown's blanket,
originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

i can't believe it, but on 10/21/05 i finally finished cross stitching this blanket. i started around christmas time last year when i found out my friends dave and maria were expecting their first child. well, almost a year later i've finally finished the blanket. dara is now over 4 months old!

so, the lesson learned is it takes longer to make a blanket than a baby. remember that when you're thinking of doing either.

whose child is this?

check out my brother's blog for a hilarous rendering of my mother and a recent unfortunate event.

peace corps interview

some have been asking how my peace corps interview went on friday, though i think i might have already recounted my impressions to most of you. but for those who're interested here's a brief summary.

the long and the short of it is that we'll definitely get into peace corps (barring any medical complications). bernadette, our regional recruiter, said that she was going to start the recommendation process before we've even finished our interviewing with her. see chris's post for more detailed info on the process (or the peace corps website). in any event, she has to recommend us to national peace corps, then they call us back with an offer. when bernadette recommends us she picks a location and a type of job she thinks we'd be good at. pc national can take the recommendation by offering us something within those paramaters or they could offer us something totally different, it's their descration based on what is available. anyways, bernadette has it in her head that we would be best suited for an agricultural assignment. now if you know me and chris at all you'll know that our agricultural experience pails in comparison to our youth work and community development experience and you might be thinking we'd be more suited to that type of work. but bernadette does not really listen so well to what we want. she wants us to be "flexible" and be "open to the peace corps experience." she says that they are in dire need of people willing to do ag work and that it is extremely difficult to place couples, leading us to believe this might be the only way we'd get into pc in the next decade.

now, i think in general an agricultural assignment wouldn't be so bad if it were in africa . we'd still be in the country of our choice; we'd still be living and working in the community and learning a lot about the culture; and frankly, all povery, social inequality, etc. in developing countries are tied very closely to agriculture. so that would be cool. BUT bernadette has given us doubt that she is really listening to our desires and chris and i are sceptical that we'll get africa. so in summation, we're still going through the process with pc, but we're really going to be sure to have some other back up programs which might be more suited to our specific desires. (our couples interview is friday, november 18th--more then.)

they're up

you got it, square dancing old folks!,
originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

finally posted the pictures from the weekend in mississippi. click on the picture to see the album.

witty title goes here (i'm tired tonight)

after 2+ years of sitting (peacefully i might add!) and not actively participating in church in terms of lectoring, eucharistic ministering or what-have-you, i've finally decided to get up and serve again. there's really no excuse for me taking so long to do it, except that i got worn out from my last church, which i admit is a poor excuse because that's why people get worn out (because there's not enough of us!). but anyways, tonight i got trained (which is a funny concept as i was never trained before) but i appreciated the training. and starting next sunday i'll be a eucharistic minister again. check out the schedule if you'd like to come at receive from me (that's a joke). i'm looking forward to it.

thanks acs

i can't believe i'm saying it, but thank you, student loan corporation. they just forgave $300 of my undergraduate perkins loan because i work with "at risk youth." for once it pays to work for no money! woohoo!

a small step for mankind (catkind?)

allie,
originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

alright, i don't 100% buy maslow's hierarchy of needs as an absolute theory that will explain or fix everything in and of itself. but i do think he had a good point on the lowest level and i got to see it in action this weekend.

on thursday chris's parents found this kitten (if you can call it that, it's so small (smaller than the picture looks!)). they tried to put the kitten with another momma cat who had just given birth, but she rejected him. so they brought her into the house and started bottle feeding her. on thursday she was so small and starving for food and water that she could barely hold her head up. on friday, when chris and i arrived, she was mostly sleeping and lolling around, waking only to eat (voraciously!). by saturday she was interacting a bit and even peeing! on sunday, though, she had a complete transformation. she was roaming around the house, eating the solid food in the other cats' bowls and even playing (with the one who wouldn't hiss and swat at her, thanks buffy).

i have to say, as someone who works in the world of long range goals it was amazing and gratifying to see a theory in action. as i watched the kitten gain more and more strength (and subsequently, gain skills) i felt that she was taking the small steps that so many of the kids in our country are also struggling to take. so many skeptics think that children can overcome any obstacle, and they can. but there are people out there struggling to just make it another day. if this kitten can undergo such a drastic transformation over a weekend imagine the difference that can be made in our country if we just gave people a fair chance.

honeymooners

happy (10th?) anniversary tomorrow to mom and jim!

reid shinanigans

this weekend chris and i head off to mississippi for the reid family reunion. some highlights to be expected (in no certain order):

seeing the reids (of course)
the reid reunion on sunday
sleeping in a king sized bed in a dark cool room
going to the mississippi fair (fried candy bars, perhaps?)
meeting the blues (finally!)
lots of animals!

enough is enough

dag yo! when does it become a child welfare issue??

FAST

i facilitated the second session (out of 10) of my families and schools together program at elw last night. it went really well. actually, it was probably the smoothest session i've ever run. that would be thanks in part to two things: 1) only 5 families (also out of 10) showed up. i'd love to have better attendance, but it is always easier to have fewer people. 2) i have a really good team. sure there's one guy who does nothing, but you'll always have that. the other staff and volunteers are great! (thanks tricia helping out!) they're the kind of people who can just do something and not have to be walked through it, which seems to be an amazingly rare trait these days. so thanks guys for making my job easier!

papa reid update

the CAT scan on friday indicated still no change. he will continue chemo as regularly scheduled and the next checkup will be in december. the doctor was very pleased, as are we.

caffeine

caffeine,
originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

one of my most favorite things in the world is my morning cup of coffee. i am very particular about it. i usually only have one cup a day, no more, definitely no less. but what provides me with almost more joy than the actual cup of morning joe is the arrival of my new shipment (ordered in 5 pound packages). for the next 6 months i'll be savoring oromia blend.

hurry up and wait

i had my peace corps interview scheduled for 2:00 PM today. for the past couple of days i kept thinking it was at 12:00 and had to remind myself, no waldie, not 12:00. it's 2:00. 2:00! bernadette lorenzo was going to call home at 2:00 and i was totally jazzed.

well at 12:00 the phone rang and it was bernadette rescheduling the interview! perhaps i'm psychic.

but i'm bummed because i was really excited about the interview. not just excited about the interview itself, but i like to get things done. this would've been another check off the list of things to get done and would've been one step closer to being in africa.

oh, well. so now we're rescheduled for friday, october 21st at 3:00. this time, i'm going to keep thinking 3:00 and it'll happen. hopefully.

another one enters the blogosphere

gashwin.

1 hour 15 later

turns out they didn't really need me at the red cross afterall. i should've known, and i kind of did. but i sat for an hour and talked to a very nice case worker/volunteer, got a brief tour of the building, and came home an hour early. that's my karma for laughing when chris's application got overlooked a month ago.

the good news is that i got home an hour early. and as i'm sitting here typing this the phone rang and i was able to have a very pleasant conversation with my father-in-law, with whom i speak rarely, if ever, on the phone.

diggin'

diggin',
originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

this is a picture of chris, with our head lamp on, trying to get something from behind the stove. something i dropped, i should add. what a sweet husband.

but i posted this picture because it seemed to be a fair euphemism for what this week has been like...diggin' to stay afload.

both chris and i have been super busy for the past few days. he's been busy with school work, exams, and work work. i worked 10+ hours monday, 12+ hours tuesday. and today i finally worked a normal workday, but i am about to head off to volunteer for red cross katrina disaster relief. it's my first night at it so i'll let you know how it goes. i don't really know what to expect but at least it's not my normal work.

that goat's got devil eyes!

as many of you know, chris and i have no tv. so we tend to be a little out of the loop when it comes to tv shows and pop culture....alright, alright, it's ME who's out of the loop. chris reads enough magazines and "stuff" to keep him amazingly up to date. ANYWAYS, at a friend's house on friday night i was FINALLY able to see some of snl's tracy morgan skits, brian fellow's safari planet and astronaut jones. i didn't see all of the shows, but i saw some of the favorite and oft quoted of the reid family. hilarious!

i heart america

yesterday i went to the opening ceremony and swearing in of the new city year class in columbia. i love going to those events every year. it reminds me of my own americorps year, which i feel so far removed from, and makes me feel connected again. i even teared up during the star spangled banner, which i've been known to do from time to time. it also reminded me that good things are always happening in small movements around the country and that people are working to make positive change. it's nice to have those refreshers every once in a while.

CSAs are great.

round river farms entrance,
originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

thanks round river farms. for 16 weeks of delicious, organically grown produce and other (fun stuff--today in our last share we got home-grown sponge!) delivered right to our local grocer. it's been fabulous.

12 hour day #1

today was my first of the 12 12 hour tuesdays that i'll be working in a row this semester. with several programs running in one day it's unavoidable.

i think it went fairly well though. started off the day running 4 hours of training for my new city year team. i'm very excited about them. the team has 8 people and most of them seem to be fairly competent and enthusiastic. ended my work day with a 2 hour info session for my family program. half the parents showed up, which is more than i was expecting. so that's good.

now i'm ending my actual day with eating a poptart (toasted). it's yummy.

who you gonna call

it's always disappointing when you go back as an adult and see a movie that you knew as a child to be really good, only to find that it's really not that good. chris and i rewatched the ghostbusters this weekend and were fairly unimpressed. i mean, don't get me wrong we enjoyed it and it was fun to see again (the one-liners are classic--"we came. we saw. we kicked it's ass!", but as far as movie-making, we've come a long way, baby.

scuttlebutt

chris just posted some of his thoughts regarding the new scuttlebutt that's going on around a potential document that will be coming out from the catholic church regarding gays being banned from becoming catholic priests. i agree with what chris says so read his post.

i also want to add my two cents by also quoting an email that i sent to our young adult catholic listerserv at st. thomas more.

it is curious to me that there has been no talk (and i
may be wrong on this, but at least i have heard no
talk) about similar rules/changes to the female
religious life. certainly there are similar
percentages (if not larger?) of nuns who are lesbian.
yet there seems to be no issue with this on the part
of the church hierarchy (or at least not a big enough
issue to make them change the rules, like we're
potentially seeing in the priesthood).

it seems to me that this is the continuation of the
stereotype that has existed throughout recent history
which believes that lesbian women are innocuous and
gay men are a threat. clearly the same physical,
emotional, spiritual, etc. reaction/connection is
present whether you're a gay man attracted to another
man or a lesbian woman attracted to another woman (or
among heterosexuals for that matter). but the thought
of men being attracted to other men has in recent
society been looked upon as more deviant and as a
threat to individuals and society than lesbianism.
which is where the incorrect and extremely hurtful
misconception of gay men being sexually deviant and
pedophiles comes from. it is from fear and
misunderstanding.

if this ruling is indeed a reaction to the church
sex abuse scandal, perhaps our church fathers should be looking at how sexual
morality is taught in the seminary, or how the call to
celebacy is handled and how to help support priests
throughout their life to continue this difficult call.
pedophelia is a very serious psychological disorder
and is not to be taken lightly. i think it is really
easy to scapegoat people as an easy out. it is more
difficult for the church to look at themselves and
question how did they help create a subculture where
this kind of behavior was tolerated and hidden. and
even harder to figure out how to move away from this
and strengthen our church fathers and heal our
community.

so obviously i feel that this is the wrong way for the
church to go about this whole process. the church as
an institution changes very slowly (which i think is a
good thing). but what is happening is that society has
changed so rapidly, and with it the people within the
church are also changing. the church has not developed
an effective method to help our priests make the
cultural transition which must happen to live the life
of a father in our traditional catholic church.

for more information on the supposed document you can see this site or this site.

thanks lady

for lending me (well, giving me actually) $.35 in the grocery store when all i had was plastic as payment.

keeping more than just your chin up

today should've been a monday. it was just one of those days. i was so exhausted this morning i could barely stay awake on the drive to work. then i made a bunch of really stupid simple mistakes at work that made me look like a total idiot. you know the kind of stuff i mean, sending emails to the wrong people, mistaking important dates. that kind of stuff. oh, and, my skirt fell off in the hallway. no, i'm totaly serious. my skirt fell almost completely to my ankles. in the hallway. of a public middle school. my saving grace: there was only one girl in the hallway at the time. she saw it but handled it really well for a middle schooler. we do have cameras. i don't know if anyone watches them unless there is an incident. but i keep imagining my principal reviewing the tape for some reason and coming across footage of me walking down the hallway with my skirt slowly falling down my legs. how rediculous.

one degree from rock stardom

you, baby.,
originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

chris and i had a great weekend in charleston. we went to see chris's old pal andy play in mike doughty's band. check out this video (andy is the one in the cowboy shirt playing upright bass.) we'd seen mike doughty in councert once before, but he really rocked it this time. the band was excellent (and i'm not just saying that because our friend is the base player.

we also were very fortunate to go with some great friends who offered up their friend's house for all of us to stay in. it was like a mini vacation. there was a pool and we had our own room. so much fun! you can see my pictures here. (if it works. i'm trying all kinds of new technology in this post.)

tsunami

now my brother has a blog too! insanity!

pandemic

it's a wave! watch where it's going next!

new blogger

my husband's new blog. ain't he cute?

landscapes of the mind

I will not live an unlived life.
I will not live in fear
of falling or catching fire.
I choose to inhabit my days,
to allow my living to open me,
to make me less afraid,
more accessible,
to loosen my heart
until it becomes a wing,
a torch, a promise.
I choose to risk my significance,
to live so that which came to me as a seed
goes to the next as a blossom,
and that which came to me as a blossom,
goes on as fruit.

-Dawna Markova

(thanks mom for thinking of me and emailing me this quote.)

hooray for extended family reunions

hooray for extended family reunions!

disconnected

for the past 2 days chris and i have had no cable. you may say "no cable? big deal!" oh but it IS a big deal, my friends, because cable doesn't provide us with TV (we don't have THAT kind of cable); it provides us with our connection to the world via internet and phone. so for two whole days (well, nights really) we've been utterly disconnected. but rest assured we are now connected, ergo i am posting this message, and the phone lines are open for us to now take your calls.

weekend ramblings

even though i worked late last night, chris and i still managed to make a really nice evening of it. when i got home i was jonesing for a walk because i had just been sitting on my duff for 4 hours in a training and it was gorgeous outside. so we took 2 laps around the neighborhood and then settled in to watch the lost boys of sudan. it was an excellent movie and i highly recommend seeing it. it shows the complexities of bringing refugees to this country "for a bettery life."

we slept in late this morning and resisted the urge to go to waffle house by making a big homemade breakfast instead. then we went to our local red cross to see if we can help at the katrina refugee evacuation center which is right down the street from us. when the woman heard that i had done some disaster relief in new york she basically forgot chris was there :( and was all about me helping, which is cool but i felt bad that chris was dissed. next, a few erands and a walk around our pretty (though hot) riverwalk. tonight we're going on a date! since this is the first weekend in weeks that we're not financially in the red we're going to get a bite to eat and then going to see batman begins at the $1.50 theater!

thought-provoking katrina-related news

and now for some real news you can use.

the bounty of the morning

IMG_0936,
originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

there are, count them, 6 (SIX) tomatoes growing on this plant. plus basil. the plant in itself doesn't look too hardy, but it's producing. and the tomatoes are yummy.

resources

there is so much going on right now, i feel like i can't just not mentioned it. but on the other hand, i hate to beat a dead horse, as they say. i think sean put it very simply but profoundly.

some resources that i've come across if you want to help in ways other than donating to the red cross.

http://www.hurricanehousing.org - this is a database where if you have available space in your homes you can offer it up to victims to use as temporary shelter.

http://erideshare.com/llistings.htm - this is rideshare information.

i also heard a rumor that columbia will be housing a bunch of families at our military base, fort jackson, and that over a hundred students will be attending 1 of the schools i work at. if that's true, then i'll probably have more opportunities for folks to get involved with these refugees, if you're interested.

pure nerds

i'm 60% nerd, 26% geek and 47% dork, which they categorize as "pure nerd." but i think it's really not much of anything, or non-commital, which i feel is more accurate of myself. but i'll take pure nerd because it makes me sound smart. chris is also a pure nerd, weighing in at 82%. that means he's really smart.

chris's parents

thanks everyone for your emails regarding chris's
family and the recent disaster in mississippi and new
orleans. as of right now chris's family has sustained
minimal damage. his parents had some trees and limbs
fall which hit the fence surrounding the dog yard and
their house; some shingles also blew off the roof and
some lights on their back porch were broken. they have
had no power for the past few days and it's hot, so
you know how that goes. some friends from the coast
have been staying at their place until they can go
home (if they have a home to return to). so whetever
damage the reids face is nothing in comparison to what
their friends will see when they go home.

the grandmothers are ok as well and i think they got
power back yesterday. the family closer to the coast
are also fine. we're still trying to get in touch w/
friends in mississippi and new orleans, but we expect
it'll be a long while before we hear from them.

thanks again for your thoughts and prayers. this is
all so crazy. chris's parents said that the shelters
in vicksburg are all full and that some of the casinos
have started letting people sleep in their hallways
and lobbies. i know that there are a lot of stories in
the media of looting in N.O. and stuff, but i really
feel that, just like during 9/11, there are more
untold stories of heroism and kind-heartedness during
this rough time.

clownie

IMG_0926,
originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

boy, it feels like it's getting longer and longer between blogs these days. sorry, blog readers! what with life going every which-way at once and chris using the computer a lot for schoolwork...well, you know the story.

but! thanks to my generous sister, hopefully this problem will be slightly resolved. she's given us her "old" laptop! i use quotes because certainly it's a bit out of date, but as far as us charity-cases go, it's golden.

i spent the weekend in philadelphia and delaware to pay my respects to my stepmom's father, alex pashalis, a generous and kind man who passed away suddenly last week. despite the morbidity which drew me up there, i enjoyed playing with my nieces, one of whom is pictured here in what was a hilarious bonding session between me, my older niece and clownie (as i am now calling her).

this week was jam-packed with stuff, but by some sort of grace, the 2-part class i was taking tuesday and thursday nights was cancelled. this has allowed me to write what you see here and do the dishes which were slowly seeping out into the surrounding rooms (and developing mold).

done, done and not quite done

i submitted my peace corps application today. i would say it's officially done but they immediately emailed me more forms to fill out. i've heard that this is pretty much the process right up until we leave the country, so i'll try not to get my hopes up when i submit these next round of forms.

i had a good chuckle at work today, thanks to fuzzy. the picture of the hedgehog was cute, but the picture of the baby otter just totally cracked me up. so thanks for that. and anytime i need a laugh in the future i'm going to try and resort to the mantra "Baby hedgehogs are the new baby otters (which, you'll remember, are the new kittens)."

paula and i are taking a walk tonight and then we will read together.
theresa and zoltan visit tomorrow night and we will go to hear bluegrass.
chris and i will go to charleston on friday night and i will get ready for my early, early flight to philly on saturday morning. there's always stuff to do isn't there? these stuffs are good though.

innocence

innocence,
originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

is this picture not just the most precious thing in the world? there's just something so sweet about it, i had to share.

so you might be wondering what's been going on, since i've not blogged in a while? well, a whole lot and not so much all at the same time. mostly chris and i have started working on our peace corps applications. with any luck we'll have them submitted tonight! they've taken a lot of time and have been sapping all of my desires to be on the computer more than is absolutely necessary.

peace corps is just the beginning of the apps. we'll apply for a couple at least one, probably 2, more. in light of all this i'm staying at my job until we leave (hopefully in 9-12 months). staying at my job sucks because there's so much junk going on but i won't bore you with the details.

4 more tomatoes on the way in my little potted plant. they're beautiful. and so was the weather last night and this morning!

and i'm still rereading harry potter 5. have been reading it since like a month ago. the pressure's on though b/c i have someone waiting for it. maybe i'll finish that by the weekend. that is, if i'm not working on more applications.

good eats!

dag, we just had one of the best dinners we've eaten in a really long time! and i'm not trying to boost myself up as any great cook. my friend, michelle, had emailed a recipe for thai noodles a long time ago and i never got around to cooking it. i've been bored with food lately so i was looking through my recipes for ideas and ran across the recipe and decided to try it. boy howdy, it was goood (so good it needed an extra o). so i've pasted the recipe below for anyone who might be intersted in trying it. it's very easy to make.

Thai-Style Noodles W/ Peanut Basil Sauce

Servings: 4

1 c. fresh snow pea pods
1 9 oz pkg. Refrigerated fettuccine
3/4 c. coconut milk
1/2 c. crunchy peanut butter
1/2 c. vegetable broth
3 TBL soy sauce
2 TBL lime juice
2 garlic cloves, minced
2 tsp sugar
3/4 tsp ground coriander
1 tsp dried crushed red pepper
1 c. bean sprouts, divided
1 c. firmly packed Thai basil leaves, shredded (i used just regular ol' basil)
1/4 c. dry roasted peanuts, chopped
red pepper flakes, peanuts, lime wedges

Trim snow peas and cut in half diagonally.

Bring water to a boil in a large heavy saucepan; add snow peas, and cook 45 seconds. Drain. Plunge into ice water to stop the cooking process. Drain and set aside.

Cook pasta according to package directions.

Whisk together coconut milk and next 8 ingredients in a large saucepan. Cook over medium-low heat, whisking occasionally, about 5 minutes or until mixture is thoroughly heated.

Add snow peas, hot cooked pasta, 3/4 c. bean sprouts, and 3/4 c. basil. Toss and place on a serving platter.

Sprinkle w/ remaining 1/4 c. bean sprouts, remaining 1/4 c. basil and 1/4 c. peanuts. Service w/ assorted condiments.

food and friends

generally a good weekend so far and one more day to go. spent friday night making some kick ass pesto with homegrown organic basil. and made a first attempt at edamame, which turned out really yummy. (imagine boiled peanuts only w/ soybeans instead.) saturday morning i had a nice chunk of time reading (harry potter. i'm reading backwards in the series from 6-1 again) and sipping coffee in bed. then, a few hours at the pool, which was hot but really relaxing. last night i babysat w/ some good friends, more like hanging out w/ the girls than babysitting. today is church and then going to a friend's house to see pictures of her 2 years teaching in tanzania, which should fit right in w/ chris and my recently resurfaced frenzied conversations about going abroad. it's been a good balance of relaxing time and friend time. good stuff.

apologies

for those of you that are daily blog-checkers like myself, i'm sorry i've dissappointed you for the past week with no posts. i feel guilty. but i haven't really had anything that's inspired me to post over the past week (the tomato was that exciting i guess (it was delicious by the way)). i was just checking other people's blogs and going "dag, why don't they post!?" then i couldn't remember the last time i'd posted; so i looked at my blog and realized it's been a week! lame.

hot tomato

I HAVE A TOMATO! on my tomato bush that is. i've never successfully harvested an actual tomato of my own. i've tried, but nothing has ever flowered and turned into an actual edible fruit. i'm so proud! there are 3 tomatoes at this point, 1 is ripe, 1 will be ripe in a few days and the last is just a toddler-sized tomato. i'd have taken a picture but our camera is on loan for the weekend. so you'll have to use your imagination to conjure up its sumptuousity.

grandad and his melons

grandad and his melons,
originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

sorry i haven't posted in a while. i looked at my blog today to see if there was any recent activity (why?) and realized that i had left the last blog with such negativity. sorry to leave that up for so long.

so what's been going on? well, chris is back. woohooo! yippeee! yip yippeeeeee!

we went to my maternal grandfather's family reunion this weekend in western pennsylvania. hadn't been to one since before i met chris. it was a great time. i even won at bingo for the first time in my life. five whole bucks, which i subsequently blew at texas holdum (is that how you spell that?). but i held my own fairly well considering it was my first go at the game. i even had fun (despite my family bickering about the rules and how cut throat everyone else was being). all in all it was a good weekend.

now we're back to the hum-drum of everyday life. and that sounds really good to me for a change.

sad news on the job front

well folks, i didn't get the job. found out today. i was told that they hired someone who had a "skill set that was better than" mine, whatever that means. it is suspected that they hired someone with a phd. how could i compete with that? more importantly, why would someone with a phd interview for a job at that level!? i mean, it would've been a step up for me, but it's defenitely a step down for someone with that level of education. i truly feel that that's an indication of our current economic state of affairs. we have so many overly educated people with not enough jobs, especially in the social service industry, and we're all just struggling for a job, let alone a job that we're educated and qualified (or overqualifiied) for. so anyways, that's all i can say on that. i'm disappointed but as they say, whenever God closes one door, he opens a window.

waiting

still haven't heard about the job. they told me on friday that they'd like to have a decision about it by "next monday." i should have asked for more specifics because that could mean the monday that just past yesterday or the monday that has not yet come. so now i'm just waiting. not so patiently i may add.

as for the bronchitis: i went to the DR (a different DR) yesterday and he said he didn't think it was bronchitis. he used some fancy word for post-nasal drip because of allergies to something and gave me 2 more prescriptions. "take these and call me in 2-3 weeks if it doesn't get any better." gee thanks! science is just a guessing game anyway. he doesn't really know what's wrong with me. they just want to fill me up with chemicals and crap and hope something hits the right button to make it go away. well i'll let you know in 2-3 weeks if science works out in my favor this time.

between home and hogwarts

i've been at home resting my bronchitis for most of the past 2 days. went in for the morning on both thursday and friday but each day my supervisor's talked me into taking the rest of the day off. i didn't really look forward to sitting home for a bunch of days by myself. but harry, hermione, and ron have kept me due company, not to mention my real-life friends who are sweet enough (or weird enough) to want to hang out with a coughing whiner (or wiener, whatever).

i did go to my interview on friday. i thought i did as well as i could have done. i don't know who i'm up against but if i don't get it, then there's nothing i could have done to get it, if that makes sense.

careful moves

as it turns out i have bronchitis. or so the doctor at doctor's care assessed after seeing me for all of 3 1/2 minutes. $50 for 3 1/2 minutes and 10 shiny white horse-tablets. i guess that's a fair trade-off. i was trying to wait to see my regular doctor for $15, but couldn't wait until monday. 5 nights of pontentially good sleep is well worth the extra $35, i think. that is, if it is indeed bronchitis and the horse-pills work.

oh, and, i have an interview friday. i'm not nervous about the interview itself, but rather about telling my supervisor that i've applied for this job. it's a good thing to do and in all cases the most advantagous politically, being that i would still share offices with my potentially former bosses if i do get the new job. but i'm not looking forward to their reactions. keep your fingers crossed for me. yikes!

unproductivity

this is the first time i'm blogging while at work. ooooh, what a rebel. it's just been "one of those days," starting with the internet going down from about 10:30 till 2:30 when i finally said, screw this crap and came to the main office. i came here to be productive, really. but no one is here so i'm basically just killing time so i can clock in the required 7.5 hours/day. what a pain. sorry i'm being so negative. just venting.

nice people are nice

it was pouring rain when i went to drop my movie in the drive-thu drop off at our library. eventhough it's a drive-thru, you still have to get out of your car to put your item in the box. i was waiting for the little old woman in front of me to deposit her items and drive away before i got out so i wouldn't have to stand in the rain. she got out of her car, deposited her items, walked around her car and approached my window, where she offered to put my movie in the slot since she was already out of her car and wet. it was such a generous offer i couldn't refuse. how nice is that?!

pride and prejudice

dude! the pride and prejudice mini-series by A&E is awsome! how did i not know about this before? i have never read the book (i will now) but, i blushingly admit, i am a fan of those sappy-type period dramas. i think, though, that even if you're not a fan of those type of stories this is a great movie! an epic 5+ hours long, plan your whole day to watch it straight through! (p.s. colin firth is easy on the eyes.)

home alone

so i'm back at home in columbia. it's very good to be home again, though after 2 days i've still not unpacked my bags. chris is at his parents' for the next 3 weeks, so i find myself very much home alone.

it's odd to be "on my own again," even if it is only temporary. having him away for a day or 2 or even a week does not bother me, but i find 3 weeks alone to be very daunting. so i'm taking it day by day so as not to get too sad.

and to help me get through my days i’ve borrowed 10 movies from the library (and have already watched 1). and i’m lining up projects and plans to keep myself occupied as much as possible. the big test, will i go back to the gym? if i go back to the gym you know i’m really lonely! we shall see.

new links

so you may have noticed that i've added two new links to the right of my site. one is to robin's blog, she's a friend from americorps, who i was fortunate enough to see for one night in boston. i hadn't "seen" her since my wedding 2 years ago (i use quotes because i saw her but didn't really talk to her since i was doing the whole getting married thing). the other link is for a college friend, theresa, who i also saw in boston and she and her husband, zoltan, so kindly put me up for a few days (right on the brink of theresa's big trip to japan for some smarty pants neuroscience conference.

i'm a tv junkie!

i'm back in ny after my trip to boston and new hampshire. i visited a friend in nh who 21 days ago delivered her first baby. i'll post pictures of the beautify baby dara brown when i get back to mom's house and have the ability to download.

but in the meantime, i'm hanging out at a friend's apartment in "the city." i'm so tired from visiting people and go, go, going that i can't stop watching tv. i think i'm a tv junkie in the making! yesterday i easily readopted my old addiction to the food network and today i've discovered the discovery channel. i watched a show on sharks because chris isn't around and now i'm watching the designer guys, or something like that.

i'll probably go through withdrawl again when i go home where there's no tv. but that's okay because my addiction is better off curtailed. otherwise i'd get nothing done.

bean town

boston9502_01,
originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

i was going to post a picture from the michael feldman show that i saw in trenton on saturday, but i couldn't get the photo to upload. so i'll skip posting about the show (which was fabulous!) and post about where i am now.

i'm in boston! got here at about 5:30 tonight and hung out with my friend theresa's husband until she got back from the lab (she's a phd student in neuroscience at mit! smart!). so anyways, i'm hanging out w/ her and some other friends in the boston area until wednesday. fun stuff.

i'm tired. goodnight.

michaelpalooza

michaelpalooza,
originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

so the whatd'ya know? michaelpalooza visit to my mother's house was a smashing success, in my humble opinion.

after months of planning on my parents' parts, about 15 folks from the npr radio show pulled into our driveway (well, into our street b/c the bus was WAY big) at about 1:15 yesterday afternoon. here is a picture of me talking with michael feldman, the host of the show (that's my mom's friend, sharon, next to me talking with jeff hammond, the show's bassist). michael, i guess, is the "biggest star" of the group for most people. but i ended up talking with the other folks more. not that michael wasn't nice, because he totally was. the whole crew was super nice and down to earth. i'll have more pictures posted at a later date, probably after i return from my trip in another week and a half. but i thought that inquiring minds might've wanted to know, so i posted this.

tomorrow is the radio broadcast from the war memorial in trenton, nj. so check out your local listings for times of the broadcast in your area, because i would imagine that they'll talk to us on air or at least mention the visit. also, check out their website for pictures, a blog about the road tour and live video from micheal. he took A LOT of video so i hope there will be some cool shots!

NY yaa!

so i'm in ny. arrived last night after a straight shot 1 1/2 hour flight. good deal; i'll never do connections again. but i sat next to the bathroom, so the whole flight was tainted with stank, who's essence tainted me for the rest of the night.

met up with a few friends for dinner. despite the good review by city search of el rey del sol, the dinner was a complete disaster. the server was a total idiot and ignored us the whole time and it took over an hour for us to get our food. i got the "vegitarian tomale plate." the first tomale was good but a bit cold. but the second tomale had some strange contraption of stretchy non-vegitable-like substance. i had no idea what it was but it looked like a sinewy piece of meat. so i brought it to the attention of the server who was not our server but took over our table in order for us to get our food (ever). he took my tomale with his hand (no plate) into the kitchen where the sinewy substance was declaired "cheese." because he carried it with his hand i didn't get the tomale back, but still paid $10 for the plate.

the company was great though! and the restaurant played good music.
and i'm still in ny!! wooohooo!

yeee dawgies!

yeee dawgies!,
originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

or should say yeee horsies?

the horse is rio and he's paula's. she and sean so graciously invited us to ride him, aka "sit on him while he walks," this morning.

all 4 of us took turns on this magnificent, albeit slow, steed and a fun time was had by all. perhaps with the exception of rio, who wanted to eat grass, not walk and pretend he was being ridden by either A) a cowboy or B) a rider of rohan (in both cases, that'd be chris).

the end

today was my last day helping at bantu hell--- i mean camp.

no really, i actually am going to miss the buggers. 2 kids grabbed my arm as they were loading the bus, wanting me to go home with them. i found myself responding, "no. i'd love to. but no. i cannot go home with you."

"i'd love to????" what's up with that?? but the truth is, i would love to have something to do with them again in the future. but no more bantu camp! i am done with that, thank God!!

SummerSPLASH day 3

day 3: no tears! today was actually a fairly good one. we had a long fieldtrip to the park. so the kids spent most of the day outside and doing unstructured activity. it was a nice break for them and for me! 2 days to go and eventhough the kids are rugrats and driving me crazy, i have started to really like them on an individual basis and will wish to have some sort of interaction with them after camp is over. oh and, bonus. i've started to develop a relationship with the 3 adults (a mom and 2 grandmoms) who help with the camp. they have been teaching me may-maay (their language) which we all really enjoy because it allows for some sort of exchange and communication.

bantu rugrats

day 2 of me working with SummerSPLASH, the summer program for the children of the somali bantu refugees relocated in columbia. i don't really know what to say except i honestly don't know if i have the ability to make it 3 more days. seriously, dude, day 2 ended with me on the couch in tears. i hate to write such negative things but it's the most understaffed, disorganized camp i've ever been associated with, and that's saying a lot b/c i've done a lot of camps and they're always chaotic and understaffed. so i'll just leave it at that.

somethings positive...the kids are totally gorgeous and beautiful. and they have a thirst for learning. in fact the only time they behave is when they're playing soccer, watching a movie, or doing schoolwork. i'm not kidding. try to play an organized game, utter chaos. do an art activity, mayhem. give them a pen and paper and once they trade pencils a million times to ensure they've gotten the best one, they're golden. and one final positive, i'm only doing this a week. so 3 more days to go. keep me in your prayers. (i'm not kidding. i (and all the staff) need it!)

baby brown

the miracle of life! gosh! maria is my first close friend from college to have a baby. check it out. dara eliana brown was born yesterday and she's perfect. it's amazing!

i love ny

i'm so excited for my friend paula. it's her first trip to ny! how fun! which reminds me that less than 2 weeks until my trip to ny! woohooo!

so now my vacation has evolved into a cleaning spree with lots of moving of furniture, re-moving of furniture and scrubbing of floors (on my knees!). i think i'm done, though, and everything looks pretty much the same as it did a few days ago. oh well, at least i found lots of dirt and pollen under the things that i moved and re-moved. that's satisfying to know that we're dust and pollen-free....for now.

tomorrow is a trip to atlanta to visit an aunt and my grandmom. saturday, work at the farm. and next week i'll be volunteering with a summer camp for the bantu refugees in columbia. i'm sure i'll have lots to write about that because it's going to be CRAZY.

vaca

as of 3:30 PM this afternoon i am officially on vacation! so far on vacation i gorged myself on mexican food and passed out on the couch. success!

kickball!

hey y'all! we have a kickball league in columbia! did anybody know this?

the other day a good friend of mine and i were discussing exercizing, and how we hate it. well, let me be clear, we were discussing how we hate the gym, not exercizing per se. and we started brainstorming ways to get better exercize without going to the gym. (this discussion took place while getting our exercize for the day working at an organic farm .) we talked about sports leagues and such, taking walks, all that sort of normal stuff.

so after a little clickaroo on the ol' web and finding zippo in the way of fun, interesting sports leagues, i had an idea. another friend of mine is a member of a kickball league in chicago and he always posts these fun pictures and they look like they have a great time. (plus his team, james brown celebrity hot tub party, is 4-0 this season!) so i started wondering, hey how could i start a kickball league in columbia? and whatd'ya know? columbia already HAS a kickball league! yet another reason why i love it here!

anybody wanna join?

the poison ivy continues

week2.2,
originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

so, we're well into week 2 of the poison ivy saga and this is what it looks like. again, this is just a small caption of the larger picture that is covering both my legs and arms. this picture was taken last night. the weeping has stopped only to be replaced (with a vengance!) by itching.

so i'm still taking oatmeal baths, still using ivarest and now i've resorted to taking steriods. (this from a person who hates taking an asprin when i have a headache!) but it all's seems to be doing the trick because even from last night to today i can see a big difference. so hopefully i won't be grossing everyone out much longer with my detailed pictures and descriptions:)

i weep

poison ivy,
originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

i have been weepy all weekend. not weepy as in crying weepy, of course. weepy as in wounds constantly dripping yellowish substance. i couldn't resist passing along this lovely snapshot. i know, it's gross. but hey, if i have to live with it, i must share!

when looking at this picture please keep in mind that this is just one section of my legs and the poison ivy is spread from my thighs to my ankles and from my wrists to my elbows. no matter how bad this is though, at least it's not on my face and in my elbow and leg pits, because that really sucks!

but anyways, it's running its course fairly quickly with the help of several oatmeal baths daily and regular applications of calamine, hydrocortisone and ivarest. i'm hoping that the weepiness will stop tonight and it'll really start to dry out tomorrow.

poison ivy

poison ivy sucks! not that i didn't know that before. but i have caught probably one of the worst cases of poison ivy i've ever had. it's even worse than when i had it from pulling poionwood and brasilian pepper from the everglades. this time around it's from trimming the hedges at chris's grandmom's house. lesson: old ladies' houses are far more dangerous than swamps with allegators and snakes. watch out!

in mississippi

so chris and i drove 10 hours last night from south carolina to mississippi. a fairly good trip until the last few hours when we got really tired at about midnight and had to resort to making telephone calls and listening/singing along to bad music to stay awake. but it worked because we got here okay.

this is like a bonus vacation for me. i mean, i am legitimately taking sick time for "family illness"-type stuff. but it sure doesn't feel like sick time. so far i've slept in, eaten out 3 times, took a nap, sat on the porch swing in the nice weather, played on a ladder, and jumped on a trampoline! ain't too shabby! this beats work anyday!

more turtle racing

so apparently turtle racing is not just a south carolina thing. check it out!

my sister's birthday

yip yip yeeeeeeeeee! happy birthday rachel!

a thread of grace

just finished a new novel by one of my favorite authors, mary doria russell. she wrote the sparrow and it's sequel, children of god. her newest book, a thread of grace, was just as excellent a read as her other books. russell has a knack for tackling unanswerable questions about faith, good vs. evil and the meaning on "good" intentions. though i'm never quite sure if she answers the unanswerable, her books are always food for thought and fodder for questions about the meaning of life. a thread of grace is a definite read if you have the time. (it only took me a week so it's not that much time. now you have no excuse, read it!)

published!

published!
Originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

my brother's first published hardcopy book came out april 30th! (he's published books on the web previously.) it's a sweet fairytale about a love story between a young widow and a frenchman. SIKE! it's some technology woooha. don't ask me. all's i know is, he be's smart. and (and i know this is harsh) he beat my mom to publishing--and she's a writer! dag ben, why you gotta be like that!? insensitive jerk!

bike racing

last night chris and i went to greenwood, south carolina to watch a friend of ours race in the carolina heritage bicycle race. that was the first bike race i've ever seen and it was intense! i cannot overemphasize how impressed i was by the bikers and how much i enjoyed watching. the skill with which the riders possess to ride so fast, so agressively and within such a close proximity of each other is amazing. and they biked non-stop for over an hour (approx. 40 miles)!! crazy. i highly suggest checking out a live bicycle race if the opportunity ever presents itself to you!

two years

two years ago today, on a day similar to today, the skies were rainy and overcast. on that day, a miracle happened and the drizzle stopped, the clouds parted, and i walked down the isle to say "i do" to my best friend in the whole world. on that day, two years ago today, my husband and i took our first steps together in the journey of our joined lives. eventhough i know that two years is really only just the beginning, it seems like we have gone through a lifetime together already. and if two years is just the beginning (and boy do i hope it is!), i look forward with excited anticipation to all the miraculous adventures we have yet to come. thanks, scoobs, for making my life complete.

2 things i hate

when people have the nerve to park on our lawn and tailgate ON OUR LAWN!

that my car radio is no longer working so i am essentially NPR-less:(

thoughts on the new pope

so for the past two days i've had a constant feeling that i should write something about the pope. not really because i have anything to say, but because i feel like it's what i "should" do, you know, being catholic and everything.

so riddled with my own self-imposed sense of obligation i have come up with these thoughts.

i've never seen this process happen before, the last pope having been chosen before my time. so the whole process has brought out some interesting and unforseen emotions in me. these emotions came out when they officially announced the new pope, cardinal ratzinger of germany, now benedict xvi. i know nothing about ratzinger other than what i've heard from the media. so i really have no opinion about him one way or the other (not that it would matter anyway). what this whole process has done for me, however, is called into scrutiny my questions on my faith and trust that God is leading the Catholic Church and not a person or people. with the announcement of the new pope it suddenly came to my mind how vulnerable the Church is to human judgement and mistakes and how much could potentially change in a relatively short period of time. i guess that's what the folks thought immediately following vatican ii!

what i have realized, though, is that this is God's plan for the Church. and, as paula said at bible study tonight, we won't really know the results until the end. i don't know if she meant the end of time, but really that's the time scale we're
looking at here. whatever steps the Church is taking it's taking it with a purpose in mind (it's just not our purpose nor our mind!).

one of the things i really like about the Catholic Church is that it is not a democracy. this is also the thing that i think i struggle with the most, especially when the Church issues a statement in which we do not see eye to eye. but i must remember that no matter what i think is right or wrong, no matter who i "would have chosen" (if i had someone in mind, which i did not), no matter what i think is the best course of action for the Church to take, it's not up to me. and i guess that does provide me with some level of comfort. so, in God i trust to lead our Church (and in some sense provide leadership to the world) in an age of importance (though i guess everyone thinks "their age" is an age of importance, huh?).

cadberry eggs!

yowza! cadberry cream eggs are $.06 at CVS! and i only bought one. what was i thinking?!! perhaps another trip is in order.

horray for balancing the checkbook, boo for no money

for the first time in i think forever i balanced my checkbook and it actually balanced. you know, the ledger matched my statement. wow! it's never that easy. i'm so excited that i'd like to go out to celebrate. too bad i balanced the checkbook and am all-too aware that we have no money. sigh.

cutie bumblesnatch

cutie bumblesnatch
Originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

erica reid, as cutie bumblesnatch, kicks some hoola hooping butt on "don't spit the water." go girl, go!

another hooray

another hooray for today goes out for my brother, the brilliantly published! he now writes columns for MacTECH and X-Ray magazine, as well as writing several on-line books. for anyone interested in applescripting or other such mac-related hoohah, check out the first issue of X-Ray, in which ben's published.

doctor anthony

hooray for my friend anthony who successfully defended his dissertation on friday to earn him a doctorate in computer science! well done, ol' boy! well done!

whad'ya know, the journey continues...

i have to send a shout out to my mom. apparently she's going to be on michael feldmen's whad'ya know? this saturday. WYK is a comedy quiz show on national public radio (npr for us snobs). michael (i can call him michael b/c he's also coming to my mom's house for dinner) said he wanted mom on the show last weekend. but then he had the nerve to "throw his back out," like that's an excuse. so they cancelled the interview and aired a rerun instead.

so everyone out in blogger world, tune in to michael feldmen's "whad'ya know" this weekend. it tapes live on saturday at 11:00 eastern standard time and usually airs around that time. but check out your local listings b/c times vary.

oh i guess i should say that it won't just be my mom w/ michael. he's talking to all the other people whose houses he will be visiting during his 20th anniversary road show. "mom's" name is diana cutshall and she'll be the one who will be so excited that her voice will be several octaves higher than anyone else's:)

what would you do?

what would you do if you had a middle school child who was being picked on? for whatever reason. say your child was goofy or slow. or say your child was "talking to" another young girl's boyfriend? what would you tell your child if they are getting phone calls at home from people saying they want to beat them up? what if your child was being cornered in the hallways at school? having rumors spread about them? being taunted into a fight? what would you do?

tell your child to tell a teacher?
tell her to walk away?
call the other child's parent?
done. done. and done.

then what? i'm really at a loss here folks. maybe i'm just tired and in a depressed mood but i'm really not sure. the parents say, "what would you tell your child, ms. reid?" and i don't know what to say. i'm not going to tell them to fight. because i truly believe that violence breeds more violence. not to mention it gets your child in trouble too. but how do you get your child to stand up for him/herself without being a tattletale and without being a bully?

"it's possible. but it ain't easy," i say.

leroy kisses his $1100 cooter

leroy
Originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

so we went to cooterfest this saturday in allendale county! for those of you with dirty minds a cooter is a turtle! cooterfest offered cooter races, fried meats, vendors selling bootleg music & cds, and tacky dj's. what more could someone ask for!

this is leroy kissing his winning cooter. this little guy beat over 100 contendors in the under 5" category and then went on to outrace all the big guys (including a tortoise and a few snapping turtles). leroy's cooter brought home $1100 to boot! way to go leroy!

flux

i just finished reading the book flux by peggy orenstein. it's about the role of women in the 21st century and how we traverse life in a 1/2 changed society. like, for example, young girls today are told that they can be anything they want to be, do anything they want to do. but in reality that's not really possible. our society isn't set up for women to be able to actually have it all. eventually something's gotta give, be it career, family or money. in any event, a fairly good book. i don't necessarily think that everyone falls into the categories of people that orenstein studies, but i definitely think she's got some good points. too bad that most of the people who read this book will be women b/c i think it's really men who should be reading stuff like this.

kids these days...

what a beautiful day in good ol' columbia, sc. perfect weather for the field days that both of my schools were having today. i even had a few free moments to run up to the field and watch the middle schoolers galavanting around, racing one another, eating crap food and bouncing on the moon walk thingy. i have to say it was really nice to see the kids actually playing for a chance. i think kids need more time and opportunity to play. i was just lamenting the other day about the lack of playgrounds and recess in middle schools. kids these days are forced to grow up so fast. no wonder they're having sex earlier and participating in risky behavior. they are expected to make adult decisions when their brains are not fully developed and they do not have the capacity to make such decisions. i think that if they just had more time to play, they'd hold on to their youth a little longer and we'd have a much happier, much safer and much better world.

okay, so that's simplifying it just a tad. but still, kids should be able to play, darn-it!

i love my husband. he's so sweet to me, except when he coughs directly into my ear. but, i digress. he brough me handpicked weeds today and put them in a little shot glass of water on the kitchen table. i should add that they were pretty weeds. you know, wild flowers. but it was sweet none-the-less.