As SeaQueen predicted yesterday, the sun did indeed come out today!

Hooray!

Here is the Saturday morning progression - in the words of the Girlie-girl.

"All of the elements are in place for a nice sunny morning. Danielle has her tea and laptop, HB has his tea and laptop, and I have my sunbeam."

"hmmmmm... the sun looks pretty good up on the bay windowsill. Maybe I'll go up there."

"Oh, but I'd better pause and take a moment to clean my face. I just get sooooo dirty. It is hard to keep the white parts white, you know."

"All clean, now I can go up there."

"Boy this sun feels good. It hasn't been sunny all week. I thought it was never going to stop raining!"

"dang, something doesn't feel quite right. I obviously missed a spot on my face. Better get it off. "

"Huh, now I'd better rotate and get some sun on my back too. Gotta get equal coverage, you know."

"Wait! What is that!"

"huh. Well, it is gone now."

"Guess I'll just take a little nap."

"mmmmm.... life is good."

"NOW if Danie would just QUIT taking pictures of me and keeping me awake, I could enjoy my sunbeam in peace."

"Geeesh. It is rough, being the Girlie, you know."

- the end -

Note: the happy tail.

Posted by danielle at 09:36 AM | Comments (6) | TrackBack

No matter how crazy things get, I always try to go ahead and dig up a flower photo and post it on Friday morning.

However, this week has been a bit more hectic than usual and I am doing a particularly crazy experiment today, in that I will be rush rush rushing from 6:30 am - 5:30 pm or so. Actually, right now, I'm going to set up my notebook while I eat my oatmeal and drink my tea.

So, hopefully the sun will come out (?) this weekend and I can take some photos.

I'm sure I'll be posting over the weekend. But if you are not a weekend reader, have a great Memorial Day weekend!

TGIF!

Posted by danielle at 05:59 AM | Comments (5) | TrackBack

Today was the last Sunday our choir sang for the season. Yup, no choir during the summer, we have "special music" instead (i.e. solos, duets, small groups). So, today was the last day of practice and singing as a group until the choir reconvenes in September.

I'm going to miss them.

A lot.

I have never been in a choir like this one, and I doubt I'll ever find one like it again.

It is hard to pinpoint what made it so unique, because part of it is a feeling. A fellowship, if you will. The kind of community that forms because of a shared love of music and love of singing praises to God.

A big part of it is our director. She has a beautiful spirit about her. She is the kind of Christian I strive to become, supportive and understanding of all people, a remarkable relationship with God, a loving/teasing relationship with her husband, and grace under pressure, to name just part of them. Musically, she is phenomenal.

But it is not so unusual for me to work with musically talented directors. Heck, one of my former choir directors was an accomplished organist in addition to being a choir director, and would play technically challenging pieces while directing us with eyebrow movements and head bobs.

I think what really stands out is how she helps us share the emotion and message of a music piece with the congregation. Sometimes, we can get so caught up in the details. But she will bring us back to the point of why we are singing. "Think about the words. Think about this message," she would say.

It isn't just the quality of the choir. Although it is notable that almost every person in the choir is a strong soloist or duetist in his/her own right. I have been in choirs with a lot of good voices. In fact, part of how I usually end up choosing a church is the quality of the choir. Enough voices on the 4 parts, good blend, harmonies, some sense of precision about a piece.

And this wasn't the choir with the most energy. That was the choir I was in back in Maryland. Back where I had difficulty finding the right UCC church, so I ended up attending a United Methodist church. Talk about a denomination that loves their music! The Methodists have got that down. That choir really appreciated a more gospel/contemporary Christian/high energy style of singing.

So, I think it comes back to the community and the spirituality.

Even though I'd have to draaaaaaaaaag myself out of bed extra early on a Sunday morning to make it to the 1.5 hour rehearsal that took place 2 hours before church started... once I was there. Wow! We'd joke around, and laugh. And sing really tough pieces. And get lost during the sight reading, and we'd laugh at our mistakes. And we'd pick apart the hard parts where we'd just fallen apart, and tease the tenors. And the tenors would tease us back. And we'd sing for a while. And we'd tease the sopranos. And we'd sing for a while. Then they'd tease us back. And the sopranos would tease the basses. And we'd sing for a while. And the basses would get their moment to tease the sopranos...

... and you get the idea.

And our director would smile and laugh and let us have our fun. And then we'd go back to trying to make beautiful music.

And most of the time we would.

And sometimes we'd find out that while we were singing a piece for the congregation, more than one of us had gotten chills.

And sometimes we'd all get so emotional, that we'd get tears in our eyes and would be trying not to give into crying... because, Dang It, it is hard to sing when you're crying!

And that may be at the heart of what I will miss the most.

Posted by danielle at 08:37 PM | Comments (9) | TrackBack

Yes, the tree that I was convinced was going to bloom while I didn't have the camera, did indeed bloom while I didn't have the camera. HOWEVER, HB was right (yeah... You Were Riiiight) that it still looked nice last weekend.

When I was sitting at our dining room breakfast table and looking out through the enclosed sun porch, the tree just seemed to glow in the sunlight.

I saw some big, fat bumblebees buzzing around the tree and I started thinking how cool would it be to try to get a shot of a bumblebee on a blossom. Then I kind of chickened out of hanging out with the bees to get a photo. Ever since I was stung by a wasp as a kid, stinging insects have kind of scared me.

Mind you, with all of the perennials (and soon annuals) in the front of the house, I see plenty o' bees. And I usually do okay with just walking past with the attitude of "if I don't bother them, they won't bother me." But I decided not to push my luck with the tree out back.

When I actually did go out back to take some pics, I couldn't believe how many blossoms were there.

Inspired by La Pix's afternoon light series, I decided to take one photo that caught a bit more sunlight.

This one reminds me of weddings.

I also really like the parallel branches.

Now, lest you think I never take pictures except at my own house anymore, I give you a couple shots from the neighborhood.

This spot, next to our lot, makes me smile. I see mushroom bushes marching up a hill when I look at these.

When I see them, the fanciful side of me wants to lightly
bounce . on . top . of them .
up . the . hill .
from bush . to bush
as if they were stepstones or lily pads.

bounce . bounce . bounce .

*crash*

as reality sets in

The woman who owns the mushroom bushes had these flowers out in front of her house near the street. I really like the light and shadows in this photo. And I will close with it. :-)

Posted by danielle at 08:31 AM | Comments (8) | TrackBack

I passed Qui-Gon on the sidewalk yesterday as I was walking to lunch.

It all happened so fast, I barely got to react...

... first I noticed that this guy was striding toward me with really unusual boots "hmmmm... a very East German military look you got going with those boots" I thought. Then I noticed the karate robe that wasn't white but was more of a cream color.

Then as his dark brown cape swirled away in the wind, I saw the lightsaber (!) attached to his belt and it all came together.

Posted by danielle at 08:57 AM | Comments (7) | TrackBack

I have the camera with me this week (yay!), so I brought it into work with me on Monday. As I was doing my experiment, I realized that I'm in a bit of a unique situation, in that there are tools and equipment that I use in my daily life that I pretty much take for granted. However, I've decided to take pics of them for two reasons.

1. Certain views of them can be pretty &/or semi-artistic.

2. With the way technology advances, these things may or may not be the tools that we use to do molecular biology in 5, 10, or 20 years.

Even within the 15 years that I've been doing research, I have seen techniques, that used to be considered standard, get phased out as the technique has become more automated. For example, I am one of the few people my age who have done DNA sequencing by hand (because I did it in my undergrad research project and for my work-study job). Right after that time period in 1996, a different kind of DNA sequencing became more affordable and individual labs quit spending time and energy doing it themselves. At this point, I don't know of anyone who regularly does sequencing in their own lab anymore. Nowadays, you pretty much just send a sample of DNA to a sequencing facility (in house) and get the results back. tah-dah! No effort involved, except to trek the sample upstairs.

So, with this idea in mind that the kinds of techniques and tools I use today are likely to change in the future, I have decided to document some aspects of my experiments.

Here are some close-up views of my experiment on Monday.

First an overview shot of my protein gel. I don't really want to get into a lot of detail about what each thing is or how it works... I just put this pic here so that the close-up shots can be put into a wee bit of context.

Next, a close-up of the swirling bubbles...

I also really like how a dye that intially appears purple in a tube, begins to separate into green and purple (and at one step pink).

If you look really, really closely, you might notice that there are two sets of 4, 5, 6, and 7, in the pic above.

I like this last image for the soft/fuzzy watery gel part of the image contrasted with the hard/solid very electronic part of the image.

AND you can see that the dye has now separated into a red/orange line and the blue lines.

AND, from a "good job on your experiment" standpoint, it ran really, really straight.

FINALLY, from This Gel, I got some of the BEST data that I've collected in a while (yesterday).

Posted by danielle at 10:05 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack

If I lived in South Park, I would look about like this when I'm home in the evenings or on the weekends.

Mind you, there are a few things missing, not limited to, but including, HB, Girlie-girl, my laptop, and the camera. And, of course, the new Harry Potter book (Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince by J.K. Rowling) won't be out until July 16th, but that is a minor detail, right?

On a weekday, I'd look about like this.

Oh wait! Who is that coming through the lab door?

HEY! It's a few of my non-blogging school buddies!

I'm so glad you showed up! Here, let me take off my gloves and lab coat, wash my hands and I'll make us some tea.

Sorry the office is kind of a pit... but you've seen it all before.

There is just enough space here for the tea... is Blue Note okay? and um... lessee... I guess Vanilla Almond, cause I'm all out of All Day Breakfast right now.

Here, pull up a seat and have some tea and chocolate (chocolate/peanut butter cookies).

yummmmmmmm.

(Note: Teatime picture from the left is Jenski, Me, SeaQueen, and Lola. Apologies to Alex and Texas Sister for not making you South Park characters.)

Posted by danielle at 09:54 PM | Comments (13) | TrackBack

Max is a new member of my extended family. Isn't he the cutest!?

Texas sister welcomed him into her home, oh, about a month ago.

You see, she'd had an english rabbit, Zippy, for 10 years. 10 years is a long, long life for a rabbit.

We all loved Zippy a lot.

For some reason, this is the only pic I could (easily) find of Zippy.

He was a very soft, friendly, lovable rabbit who loved to be petted, especially between his ears. If you were sitting on the floor and he was out hopping around, he'd come up and bonk you on the arm when he wanted to be petted. He also loved to chew, as most rabbits do. And he loved his cheerios for breakfast, a rabbit after my own heart. ;-)

Texas sister has become quite the expert at how to bunny-proof a portion of the house so that a little rabbit fellow can be let out of his cage with proper supervision and not get into too much trouble. So, after a period of time without Zippy, she decided that it was time to look for another bunny friend.

When they were at the pet store, Max is the one who, as Texas sister's fiance was petting one of the other bunnies, came up and bonked him in the hand to be petted. This was a Good Sign, because it is also what Zippy had done when Texas Sister was trying to decide between rabbits. It also meant he was very friendly and comfortable with people.

Texas sister tells me he is very fast and can be quite tricky to catch.

He doesn't appear to be one to stand still for long.

She also tells me he is rambunctious and ornery.

Yup, looks full of bunny mischief to me.

At least until he wears himself out.

Whew! Must be tiring running around and investigating, eh Max?

Look at those back feet!

Supposedly, he is going to stay little. Of course, we've heard that before with a particular rabbit who ended up being 11 pounds at his heaviest (a.k.a. Zippy).

But maybe he'll stay little.

Goodness knows he is going to stay cute. I can't wait to meet him in person.

All pics of Max taken by Texas Sister and adjusted for red-eye by me. I took a digital pic of the print of Zippy (originally taken by Mom).

Posted by danielle at 02:32 PM | Comments (8) | TrackBack

Last weekend, if you will recall, I mentioned that it was cloudy and rainy on both Saturday and Sunday.

This was, of course, the only time that 'our' camera was at home with me these past two weeks. Yes, once again, I was without a camera all week.

You can imagine my frustration at Sunday lunch when HB said to me "You know, I'm taking the camera with me again this week."

And I replied with something along the lines of
"Dam* it! Have you LOOKED at the TREE out back lately?! It is ready to BURST into bloom. We're supposed to have NICE weather, FINALLY, on Wednesday or so. Then it is going to BLOOM and I won't get to take ANY PICtures of it!
AND the Waldstenia out front looks GORGEOUS right now!
You DO realize that this is our LAST spring in this house, RIGHT? How am I going to get PICTURES of the perennials before we MOVE?!"

(yes, I really do speak with that kind of emphasis when I'm riled up)

HB says soothingly, "It'll be okay... I'm sure it will still look nice next weekend."

To which I say "NO. Cause by then the flowers will be fading already." "Dam* it! I just need a little bit of sun today. What time do you leave"

HB "um, at 3:00"

*glancing at clock and seeing that it is 1:30*

HB "how about we pray for some sun, really fast?"

---

Yeah, so the sun didn't really come out. It was doing that "Oh, here I come, out from behind the cloud. oops! changed my mind! ha ha ha!"

But the rain stopped long enough for me to run out and take some pics, and I didn't get ALL that dirty crouching and laying on the ground to get these shots...

... just a little bit.

;-)

Waldstenia ternata (Barren strawberry)

This would be the aforementioned 'gorgeous' Waldstenia.
Yes, that is a gnat crawling around on the one in the center.

Especially when I'm coming home, the flowers are all angled toward me as I walk up the path, and really look amazing. (no, they aren't turned to greet me, although the fanciful side of me likes to think of it that way, that would be the direction where they get the most sun during the day)

As you can see in this photo, they really are very small little flowers. But something about them really appeals to me. Maybe it is because they look so bright against the green background. Or maybe it IS because they face me when I walk up the sidewalk. ;-)

The funny thing about the Waldstenia is that it is probably THE hardiest perennial we own. It can have snow dumped on top of it for 3 months, and when the snow melts, it is the only 'evergreen' perennial that really does stay nice and green. The rest of them kind of turn to mush green.

Mush green, yeah, not so appealing, eh?

These epimediums were supposed to be the big filler of our mostly shady perennial garden.

We bought them not for the flowers, but for the leaves. Of course, the flowers are a nice bonus.

Epimedium x versicolor 'sulphureum' (yellow epimedium)

The thing is, they really haven't spread all that much like I'd hoped. So much for the idea of epimediums as filler. Ah well, at least they look pretty.

Most of our hostas are past the early shoot stage, but this one is lagging behind a bit.

This is the first year I noticed that when the shoots are only an inch or two tall that they are actually purple. I noticed that on almost all of our hostas. I know they will eventually bloom purple flowers, but I don't remember ever noticing that the shoots themselves were purple.

And in the back of the house, behind the porch, we have the tree that was causing me such angst, and that did indeed bloom this week.

I decided I like having some pics of it in this pre-blooming stage too. Something about the shape of the buds and the way the budding flowers stick out.

HB comes home tonight, and he promised me that he made GOOD USE of the camera while he was gone. Of course, it wasn't like I had all that many chances for photography this week. But there were a couple moments when I would've pulled over (on my drive home) and taken some pics.

It is interesting that I find myself looking at the world a bit differently now that I am in a sort of photography-mode.

I know Sheryl (La Pixiatrix) has written about this some... but I hadn't noticed it in myself until just this week.

And this week also hammered home the point that I'm really itching to have a camera where I can control the aperture, exposure time, and focal length (among other things).

Not too much longer...

;-)

Posted by danielle at 08:28 AM | Comments (9) | TrackBack

Texas sister took this pic of Mom at Christmas, pretending to be scared of the storyline in Jude Deveraux's book Always

I don't know if you have ever heard the phrase "The family that prays together, stays together."

Well, in our family, we joke about how our version of that phrase appears to be "The family that reads together, stays together."
No, it doesn't rhyme quite so nicely, but it certainly fits.

The Family That Reads Together: Kick off your shoes and pull up a chair to read a good book

Here we are at breakfast on vacation in St. Croix, and look! books and reading material are all over the place.

I asked my mom once why she thinks Texas sister (my only sister) and I became such avid readers. Of course, my mom is an extremely avid reader and I assumed we'd gotten it from her, but I was curious to hear what she thought.

Well, she told me how she and my dad always read to us a lot when we were little. That is, I'm sure, the main reason we got so interested in reading books. However, she also mentioned that she read all of the time, and we pretty much wanted to do whatever she did.

Makes a lot of sense, doesn't it?

I remember living in southern Indiana, back when I could only read very simple children's books. I remember that we would drive out of our little rural farm town and into The City to go to the City Library. That library seemed soooo huge. Mom would send us off into the appropriate children's section so that we could pick out as many books as we wanted; perhaps there was a limit (?) but I don't remember ever having to put a book back, so probably not. And I remember how I'd stand there for what felt like forever and come up with maybe one or two books. I'd get so frustrated, because I couldn't find any books that I liked.

At some point, Mom would come over to check on me, and I'd be all upset. And she'd calmly scan the shelves and pull out one book after the other saying "Oh, I bet you'd like this one and this one." And she'd hand me books with witches or fairies or princesses or little cuddly animals. And I'd get so excited, because, of course, they were all Exactly What I Wanted To Read. And I could barely wait to get home so that I could read them all.

We'd end up with this HUGE bag of books, and we'd laugh how they'd probably last us, oh, a week or two, and then we'd be back again.

Tangent about the library
This City Library in southern Indiana was also the first place I ever saw baby rodents. Texas sister and I vividly remember when the hamster (I think?) had a litter and how the pups were all red/pink and squirmy/gross looking. eeew. but a fascinating kind of ewww to a couple of little girls.
End tangent

As I've gotten older it is easy to recognize that the love for reading that my mom (and dad) instilled in me has gotten me where I am today as far as my education and schooling goes. And I thank you for that, Mom and Dad.

It is pretty rare to find Texas Sister or I without a book, particularly when we have some free time.

Texas sister reading a book while on vacation in St. Croix

Of course, since I am usually the one taking pictures, I don't have a picture of me reading while on vacation.

But I laugh, because here is Texas Sister on a different vacation, and what is she doing?

Yup, reading. (and looking pretty happy with that drink in her hand too, eh?)

I probably shouldn't comment on her enjoying a nice frosty beverage, because that would be like the pot calling the kettle black.

HB and I holding our nice frosty beverages at Dugan's restaurant in St. Croix

And of course, who do you think Texas sister and I get that love of frosty beverages from? mmm?

Yup, Mom too. *grin*

As for my dad, you are more likely to find my dad having a conversation with someone than reading. But he usually has some reading material nearby. (yes, I get my gift of gab from him)

Dad's feet are on the right. Note the magazine underneath the binoculars and hat. He is too busy talking to Texas sister's fiance (feet on the left) to be reading his magazine. ;-)

As you might imagine, Texas sister and I were attracted to men who love books too.

Texas sister took this pic of her fiance with a book

Pic I took of HB at breakfast in St. Croix.

Note the Janet Evanovich book in the foreground. And in the background, the pool, banana tree, and ocean. Gorgeous way to spend breakfast, eh?

Over the years, Mom has found a whole slew of authors that I've become hooked on as well (um, we'll save the detail for a future post).

In fact, she is the one who introduced me to The Tea Rose by Jennifer Donnelly.

It is fitting, is it not, that it is a book that has a title involving tea and flowers? Mom also got me hooked on chocolate, but that is also a story for another time.

Thank you, Mom, for introducing me to the joy that can be discovered among the pages of a good book.

I love you...

....and I'm sending a BIG HUG across the miles to you, today, and everyday.

Posted by danielle at 04:04 PM | Comments (15) | TrackBack

It seems like everywhere I turn, people are going on vacations to the Caribbean. Well, last year at about this time, I was fortunate enough to be on vacation in the Caribbean, in St. Croix. It was a big, big deal that we got to go on that trip for several reasons.

A) I had never been on a vacation out of the continental U.S. (St. Croix is one of the U.S. Virgin Islands)

B) HB and I hadn't been on a vacation where we stayed in a hotel at a beach-like place (or a really hot weather locale) since our honeymoon, which at that point, was 8 years ago.

C) Thanks to my mom's coordination of events, my parents, sister, her then-boyfriend (now fiance!), HB, and I all converged on St. Croix for a nice long vacation (I think it was a 9 day stay).

I mentioned a while back that sometime I'd probably get sick of winter and post some pictures from that trip so that I can gaze on them and ignore the nastiness that is a New England winter. Well, this year, it would appear that the cold and rainy-ness that is a New Enland spring has gotten to me instead. ugh.

It's kind of funny, you know, I was just going to post this picture as a response to Amanda B.'s post about dancing.

And then, I started looking through the rest of the pics in my St. Croix folder, and decided that I wanted to post a whole bunch and kind of relieve that vacation a little bit. (um, I think I got a little carried away, but well, that's the way it goes with me and pictures.)

So, smear on some sunblock, grab your sunglasses and let's imagine we are on the beach, and it is sunny and warm shall we?

The water can be so beautiful. I love this next photo, not only because my parents are happy and waving at us, but because I unknowingly captured a bit of how the water color changes.

You can see a few more pics of the water and beach in the post I linked to above, or you can see it a bit in this next pic with this old iguana.

At first I was a little bit scared of the iguanas because they were so big and prehistoric looking.

But then I was told by our very friendly local island expert, J, that they are mostly vegetarians. Whew! My toes are safe! And they only get scared if you approach them from behind. In fact, they were so used to him being around, that as long as I stayed with him, they didn't really mind my coming up within 15 ft or so to take a few pics.

Then there were the little lizards running around everywhere. They did a great job at most of the places keeping the mosquito population in check.

I love how this one looks like he is on the moon. And his toes are so thin that his skin almost looks translucent.

Now that we've moved into evening pics, I guess I'll roll out the ones from our trip into town for a street festival called Jump Up. We got to hear various kinds of island music.

We listened to these guys for a while, and had a fun time dancing to their music.

I had been hoping to hear some steel drum music, and sure enough...

...this steel orchestra was made up of kids, and played some great steel pan music.

One of the big draws of Jump Up is getting to see the Mocko Jumbies.

These kids walk and dance on stilts!

Of course, a street festival wouldn't be a street festival without freshly made drinks. Heck, you can always make a bar out of the back of your truck, yo.

This gentleman made coconut based drinks with freshly pressed sugar cane.

Downtown Christiansted has some beautiful architecture. I think the views during the daytime really show off the island colors and flair.

Of course, while all of these things gave us some special activities during our vacation, the main draw was the beach and the ocean.

It was certainly no hardship waking up to this view every morning.

I can almost feel the warm breeze now.

Posted by danielle at 02:33 PM | Comments (11) | TrackBack

HB has taken the camera with him to New York, so while there are flowers bursting open ALL OVER THE PLACE, can I take pictures of them?

hmmMMMM?

no.

hurmpf.

Well, I guess he did buy the camera for work purposes originally. So, he gets first dibs on it for work.

I just grumble, because I've gotten rather attached to the idea of being able to take digital pictures whenever the creative bug strikes. And Tuesday, when I was home with the girlie, it was sooooooooooooo sunny and it would've been purrrrrrrrfect to go outside for just a wee little bit and take some pics.

He did mention a little while back (the day I was taking the sock pictures) that we should get a nicer camera for me for Christmas.

!!

Did I already tell you this? hmmmm... I know I told Victoria, but I can't remember if I've posted about this, and I'm feeling too lazy to look. Isn't that awful?

Ah, when the mind starts to fade that is the first sign...

Where was I? Oh yes. Getting a nicer camera! JOY!

Of course there is a very important opportunity for gift buying before Christmas, honey bunny. And I'm not talking about our 9 year anniversary. no sirree bob.
It starts with a P, ends in a D and has an h in the middle.

But he knows this, because he is a smart man.

So, were you expecting me to actually talk about the flowers?

Let's just gaze at them instead, shall we?

(scroll, scroll)

I know I say this about a lot of pics, but this is one of my favorites. What I like most, well, in addition to the crazy flowers, is the sundial in the background. I like how it gives the picture some depth of perspective.

Someday, I'm going to grow those crazy pink things. As the title suggests, they remind me of the plants in books by Dr. Seuss.

The Lorax by Dr. Seuss, Theodor Seuss Geisel

"At the far end of town
where the Grickle-grass grows
and the wind smells slow-and-sour when it blows
and no birds ever sing excepting old crows...
is the Street of the Lifted Lorax."

I took that picture at the gardens of the Moffat-Ladd House in Portsmouth, NH at a beautiful reception for a friend's wedding.
It was a gorgeous, perfect day. The flowers smelled fabulous.

Here is another cluster that were particularly striking that day.

I like the sunlight and shadows on this one. Actually, now that I think about it, I wish that picture up at the top had a neat shaft of sunlight coming across some of the flowers. Oh well, I'll just have to go back and visit and take more pics, right?

I am putting this here, because Mother's Day is on Sunday, and the card I gave my mom has a daylily (don't worry, I asked her to open it early, so it isn't like I'm giving it away). So, this is my little pre-tribute to Mom... who might get to leave work early today, since the city kind of shuts down early for the Derby. Yay Mom!

Hope you all have lovely weekends. I'll be visiting your blogs on Saturday and Sunday, I'm sure. I hear we might be getting a nasty Nor'easter (a storm) this weekend. blecky. more rain on the weekend. Oh well, I'll just snuggle up and read a good book.

Posted by danielle at 08:55 AM | Comments (6) | TrackBack

I just HAD to post something today, because of today's very cool date.

Tangent:
There was a part of me that wanted to make a bunch of solutions (for experiments), just so I could have a bunch of labels with today's date staring at me from the shelves.

However, I resisted.
End tangent:

I was GOING to pull up a picture from our vacation to St. Croix last spring, that popped into my head because of something Amanda B. posted this week.

However, I am not.

"Why not?" you ask.

WElll, because, you see, I was unofficially tagged with another one of those silly blog things by Ladybug. Ladybug was tagged by kalki who was tagged by Greenthumb who was tagged by Home Detention Lady... blah, blah, blah (that is as far back as I go, people, I do have my limits on the geneology of a blog meme, AND BTW, all of those links are to their actual posts of this thing.)

And you know, I read Ladybug's 'poetry' and I said "ewwww, gross. I'm glad that tag was UNofficial and I don't have to do this." And then, I went off to do one of my daily experiments that is very mindless and takes me, oh, a little over an hour every day... and WHAT pray tell is going through my head for an hour?

Turd in a punch bowl... turd in a punch bowl... turd ina punchbowl...turd ina punchbowl.... over and over and over. ad nauseum.

So, here are the rules that I remembered (not exactly the rules):

Write poetry. The first and third lines must be "Turd in a punch bowl." The rest of the lines must rhyme.

Ahem. I give you, my crowning achievement of scatalogical poseurtry.

---------------------
Turd in a punch bowl,
grab a slotted spoon!

Turd in a punch bowl,
before it turns maroon!

Turd in a punch bowl,
the guests will be here soon!

Turd in a punch bowl,
Martha S.* would swoon.

Turd in a punch bowl,
where's my camera when I need it?**

Turd in a punch bowl,
GROSS for sure, and will they read it?**

Turd in a punch bowl,
I'll stop now, I Mean It.

Turd in a punch bowl,
"Anybody want a peanut?"***
---------------------------

Oh, and I am tagging no one. I don't have the energy to figure out who has and who has not posted this one.

But Poopie, if you read this, you should totally do this one. 'cause of your name and all... I guess I'm unofficially tagging you.

*refers to Martha Stewart, of course. Even with a stint in prison, she is still the queen of throwing a delightful shin-dig of a party. The question is, would she swoon? or would she grab the slotted spoon?

** Because all bloggers know that the minute you see something unusual, your first thought is "Can I blog about this?" followed by "How can I blog about this and make it funny?" followed by "If I had a picture of this, it would be sooooooooooo much more fun." Or at least, that is what I say in MY head. Don't you?

**If you've seen the Princess Bride, you know that Andre the Giant's character (um, Fezzik) loves to rhyme. He particularly likes to follow up someone else's words with a rhyming phrase. So, in the scene on the boat, Inigo Montoya gets all upset at Fezzik's rhyming and yells something along the lines of
"Stop rhyming, I MEAN IT!"
and Fezzik's rhyming reply is
"Anybody want a peanut?"

I guess you'd have to see the movie to appreciate the humor.

Posted by danielle at 10:00 PM | Comments (6) | TrackBack

Picture that HB took of the Girlie-girl from a year or two ago - top of the stairs

I mentioned a while back, that I wanted to properly introduce the Girlie-girl, so that I could put some of her stories in context.

Well, when I thought about telling stories about her, the one I'm about to tell you wasn't quite what I had in mind.

*sigh*

You may or may not have noticed that all of the pictures I've shown you of her (unless they are from far enough away) are always of the back of her head or with her face turned away in a kind of profile shot. Well, there is a reason for that, and believe me it isn't because she likes to face away from the camera. On the contrary, it has been quite tricky to get photos of her where she isn't facing the camera head on and really close up.

You see, she has always loved to rub on boxes and books, but usually she stuck with her scent glands and the area beside her jaw.

Picture from Christmas 2003

But last fall, she started rubbing the side of her nose near her right eye against sharp corners. Well, she kept rubbing and rubbing and pawing at it until the skin beside her nose became red, cracked, and sore. ouch!

So, one Friday afternoon in November, HB got her an appointment with the local veterinarians, who specialize in cats, to see what could be done. Well, off they went to the vet. She vomitted a little bit on the way there which was not so unusual, since she is prone to car sickness (this becomes important in a bit, bear with me). They examined her and decided to treat her by putting a topical neomycin on the skin around her nose. And HB headed home with her.

Well, she vomitted several times in the car on the way home and pooped (more than normal).

When HB got her home, she seemed more distressed than normal, but the vets had warned him that she might be distressed for a little while, because she really really hates going to the vet and had her usual 'bad visit' there.

Well, in about 5-10 minutes she was panting and drooling. He called the vet (Good HB!) and they told him to Bring Her Right Back. Thankfully we live relatively close by, because she ended up going into anaphylactic shock. They did a quick chest x-ray to make sure she didn't have an underlying heart condition that was causing her symptoms (no) and gave her i.v. shots of cortisone and epinephrine. She ended up going into critical condition, and we weren't sure that she would survive the night.

And let me tell you, it was a rough handful of hours until they called us to tell us she was no longer in critical condition. One sign that she was doing better was that she was swiping at them with her paws when they would try to examine her and being her usual feisty, angry-at-the-vet self.

The vet called the drug manufacturer and found out that nationally, they've only heard of 3 cats reacting to that drug (in a different form, not topical). And that the other ones died from not getting treated fast enough.

SCARY SHIT, I TELL YOU!

So, she used up one (or more) of her 9 lives that night.

Fast forward to now.

Well, the skin on the side of her nose started getting bad again. Then she started rubbing the top of her eye near her ear. I tried warm compresses and vaseline (vet's suggestion), but nothing seemed to really fix it long term.

Within the past 2 weeks, her eye has had a lot of excessive tears.

So, with no other grand home remedies, we decided that she was going to have to go back to the vet. Well, HB took her yesterday.

And LET ME TELL YOU it wasn't quite as bad as last time, but it was close.

This time, they examined her eye in multiple ways to check her eye, in particular her cornea (fine). They think that she has a blocked tear duct.

So, they tried giving her a topical antibiotic from a different class of antibiotics. First, she waited in the examining room, and seemed fine.

Then HB waited with her in her carrier in the waiting room. Well, the minute she vomitted, he knew there was a problem. So, they rushed her back and gave her cortisone (or something that sounds like it) and epinephrine again.

At some point, she had diarrhea and at some point, they had trouble getting a vein in her legs for her i.v. injections (doesn't that sound awful?). Because well, she's furry and because well, she's chubby, you know.

At some point, in between the handful of injections they gave her, they clipped the claws on her front feet so that when she took a swipe at them, it wouldn't be quite so treacherous.

After a while, she was well enough that she fought them when they tried to give her any oral pills (prednisone) and she was recovered enough so that HB could bring her home. They figured she'd finish recovering better at home than in a cage there at the vet.

She pretty much just wanted to sleep most of last night. I petted her, and she practically slept through it.

I saw her cleaning her face at one point, so I tried wiping her face clean with a washcloth. This either pissed her off, or woke her up enough that when I next came by with a bowl and poured water into it in front of her, she decided to go to her regular water fountain and get a drink. It was a relief to have her drink some water, because she hadn't drank any water since she'd come home.

She slept nearby most of the rest of the evening.... and then we got to give her the 2 pills of prednisone that the vets couldn't get into her. OH JOY! Um, yeah, so have you ever SEEN how much damage those sharp pointy teeth can do if they decide to clamp down on your finger? hmmmMMMM? Yeah, THAT was a good time, let me tell you. I actually did escape unscathed by her teeth. I just got nailed with her front (clipped off, mind you) claws before HB remembered that the vet sometimes handled her in a towel. OH, a towel! What a great idea!

This morning, she looked much more normal and was interested in eating breakfast.

I worked from home today so that I could keep an eye on her as all of the drugs wore off. I also petted her lots and lots. And prodded her to drink water. And placed her up on her cat perch by the window this morning so that she could be in the sun. And let her sleep on my lap (you know, me, the laptop, and her).

I picked her up this afternoon and carried her into the kitchen to eat. At first, she gave me this look like "Well, if it isn't MY idea to eat, I'm not going to eat." But I walked away, and sure enough, she started eating and drinking.

A little prodding goes a long way.

Speaking of, I think it is time for my supper, as well as hers.

I think I'll close with another old picture of her from 2003.

Hopefully, she'll be back to being her curious self pretty soon.

Posted by danielle at 07:25 PM | Comments (9) | TrackBack