something you don't see every day...

Headline from Fark.com (no I don't go there, my friend had this in his LJ)

"Section of Salt Lake City on lockdown after discovering suspected terrorist trumpet. Police put out APB on the angel Moroni."

The headline is better than the story (a suspicious package was noticed, police were called, a robot detonated it, then they opened it to find a trumpet). Come to think of it, that might make a really good fictional story. I'll have to think about that...

The Weekend

Well, I did get sick. But it didn't impact me too greatly. I did miss the barn dance on Saturday night, but I made the rest of the conference. And it was good.

Friday afternoon I went to the DC Stake Center early--originally I was going to attend the temple session, but I figured taking a cold to a closed room was not a good idea. I'm pretty sure I was still contagious at that point. So I hung around and offered to help but most of the stuff was already done. I went to the Visitor's Center around 7:00pm, to see if they needed me there, and I did quite a bit of running up and down the stairs in the theater room. The Knudsens from C2 were performing, and then Sis Okasaki spoke to us. She taught us three lessons using chewing gum. It was very good. Then it was back to the Stake Center for dessert and registration. I stayed and helped clean up, then followed Linda to the Seneca Stake Center to help her unload, then followed her to her house where she let me sleep on her couch. With my cold. I thought that was very nice of her.

Saturday I did sleep in a little, but not much. I got to the Seneca Stake Center about 8:00 am (breakfast was at 9:00 am) and helped as much as I could. I made copies of the choir music (I feel my one true contribution to the conference was the music, but I did try to help out where I could). I was first in line at the breakfast buffet, when it was time, but set my plate on my table and then wandered around for a few more minutes getting juice, running to get my vitamins (an essential thing when one is sick--and thanks Mendy for the offer of the Airborne, maybe next time!). While going to the chapel where I had left my purse, I saw Lon (the piano man) at the registration table. yay!! Especially since he was to play for us. I heard him periodically throughout the day in the chapel playing the piano. He's so good. He came and ate breakfast at my table, too :D

Sis Okazaki gave the keynote address, on being of good cheer. It was very good, as expected. Then it was time for the first workshop, but I'm afraid I slipped out and went to the powder room and laid on the couch for about an hour until lunchtime. Not a great loss--that particular workshop speaker is very good, but all stuff I've heard before. After lunch Bro Daines from my ward (ok, so I had two contributions to the conference) gave his workshop on "The Morning Breaks, the Shadows Flee, and the 10th Article of Faith". Really about the Second Coming. And how it's more of a series of events, instead of a single event (hey, he quoted Elder Eyring, so it's official!). Excellent, excellent talk. Bro Daines has such a unique perspective, given his work in 71 underpriviledged countries. After that was Bro Laird from Seneca Stake talking about having balance in our lives. I'm not sure exactly what I got out of that, other than a desire to figure out where I'm spending all my time and seeing if I can bring some balance to that. Then there was another workshop from the very first workshop speaker, which I again ditched, only this time to help start cleaning up the building in preparation for our departure to the barn. Chior practice was to be after the final workshop, and she went on and on and on... like I said, she's good, but perhaps we should have only given her one workshop to do. so Choir Practice didn't start until 5:30 pm, way late, and with a trip to the barn for dinner and the dance waiting for everyone. It went ok, although short. Then I went home for some much needed rest and sleep. I had boarded my dogs for the weekend, so it was very quiet.

Sunday it was up early and off to the Seneca Stake Center. I actually got there about 8:45 am, which was early. Choir practice was supposed to start at 9:15 am, so I was able to help do a few little things. Not a whole lot needed to be done, though. People came, and we practiced our two songs for the Testimony meeting we were having. It went fairly well. The meeting itself was very good--I was very happy that Pres Johnson from my stake came and said a few words along with Pres Hammond from Seneca Stake. I again was in charge of music--the choir sang one song for prelude, and one song after all the talks and before the testimonies began. I was somewhat anxious for Pres Johnson to be there for the testimonies of the single adults. I don't think he truly has a feel for the Single Adult program, and I knew this would be a good experience for him. And it was. Lots of heartfelt testimonies. Truly, this is my favorite part of Single Adult conferences.

Then it was time for lunch, eat up all the leftovers, then put away all the tables and things and say good-bye to everyone until next year. Definitely going to do this again--and definitely going to do my best to NOT BE SICK NEXT TIME!!!

Weekends and colds

I simply cannot be sick. I had a tickle in my throat last night, and today I'm blowing my nose and sneezing. But I simply don't have time to be sick. The Seneca Single Adult conference is this weekend, and I am on the committee. I am in charge of the music, I am leading the music, and I am leading the choir. I simply must be there. So, vitamins and large bottles of fruit juice, along with some cottage cheese and pineapple (and maybe some mac and cheese since that's very good comfort food) are my new diet. For now.

Last weekend went fairly well. Saturday morning was quiet, and the dogs and I just hung out. I took them to an adoption event in Arlington--the very place where I first met them, in fact. We had fun, meeting all the other dogs and the people who had come by to meet them. There were several people interested in them, but couldn't commit to adopting at this time. There's another event on July 7 that we'll go to--third time is a charm, they say. Either they'll get adopted or I'll decide to just keep them since they are doing much better and I don't have to lock them up so much. I'll be gone a lot in July, but at least I found a good place for boarding. I think I still need someone to help me with them for MDRF weekends, but that's still in the future.

Sunday--Father's Day. A holiday I don't have to dread or simply survive. Yay! Dad actually called me before I could call him, and we had a nice talk. We were able to settle more plans for the week when he comes out to visit me. I also got to talk to my oldest brother, Blaine, who was visiting Dad with his family. It was very nice. He was making noises like he and his family may come see me sometime :) That morning I allowed the dogs to roam downstairs while I got ready for church, and they pulled all the throw pillows off the couch. Then when I came downstairs to check on them, they had to tell me about it. This is the first time they've barked at me, but it was a happy sort of 'we were playing, mom!' bark. So I think it was ok. I taught in Relief Society on Sunday too, but with everything else that was going on only got about 15 minutes to teach. Which is fine--although I hope I didn't go so fast the Spirit got dizzy. Fortunately the lesson was on something I could talk about, and was able to flex my lesson so the important parts got in. I tend to be a less-structured type of teacher anyway, to allow for comments and the need to expand or contract a lesson.

So this week I need to prepare for the coming weekend, and my doggies get shipped off to the Preston Country Club for Pets (sounds pretty nice, huh? and not as expensive as you might think). They do like it there.

Where would we be if...?

Flashback Friday--a good idea.

Today I've been thinking about my friends S&C, the ones I met up with last weekend to see Pirates. I met them back in 2000, under unusual circumstances. If not for those circumstances, there's no way we'd have ever met each other--C works at the Holocaust Museum downtown DC, procuring items for the museum and other stuff I'm sure. She is an artist trained and very smart. S works for--well, I'm not really sure, but it has something to do with Homeland Security and Immigration. She deports people, as she told her neighbor from somewhere south of the border who's fixing up her house to hold far more than just the 5 people she says will live there. Very smart woman, weilds a sword--S and C took Gum-Do, Korean Sword fighting. I couldn't because both these women live in Fairfax county and that's where the school is--and I'm not about to chance the beltway on Wednesday evenings to get to VA by 7:00pm. All three of us are single, professional women, who otherwise wouldn't have met, if not for Star Wars.

All three of us were members of an online group called alt.fan.wedge (AFW), fans of Wedge Antilles, from Star Wars (the only non-main character Lucas carried through all three original films to give the audience a sense that other people do survive big battles, not just Our Heroes). My friend B introduced me to the group (I knew her from church, so not unique that I would have known her), along with a few other groups. Well, in November of 2000, K, the Prophetess of the Animist Warrior God known as Wedge Antilles, (yes, these are the things we come up with) was coming to DC for a visit with her friend Morwen (I can use her name because it's not her real name anyway). So a call was sent out to the group, a place was arranged for us to meet, and B was even willing to go just not by herself. So we went together. We took the metro to a restaurant in DC (I couldn't even tell you where it was now) and met up with about 9 others at a restaurant in DC, including S and C. We read X-Wing books and did the drinking game (water and soda only--most of them were underage and the rest of us were driving, although C may not have been). A little daring to go into DC to meet people we'd only talked to online, but B and I were together, she'd met K before, and we figured it would be fine, and it was. After this initial meeting we tried holding 'meetings' of the DC chapter of AFW, and there were about 9 of us at the largest gathering. We would try to run Role Playing Games in the Star Wars Universe, but after our numbers dwindled to just S, C, and me, we decided that wasn't really working anymore. By then we were friends, and we got together to do things. S and I went to Star Wars Celebration II, all three of us went to Star Wars Celebration III, and even now we get together to go to movies and the Renaissance Festival and other things.

It's good to have friends from all walks of life. I have a very diverse group of friends.

Thunderstorms

When I lived in Iowa, that first year, we had a thunderstorm every day in the summer. About 3-3:30 pm it would cloud up, storm like there was no tomorrow ("end of the world" type weather), and then clear up and go away within the hour. I loved these storms. The air always smells better after a thunderstorm (and the scientist in me has to mention that it's the ozone created by the lightening that makes the air so fresh). Of course, this is also the best time to look for rainbows. I remember one day I had gone home to make lunch (I lived basically across the street from the building I spent most of my time in), the sky got very dark, it stormed, and then cleared up and the sun was shining again by the time I needed to return to my office in the Van Allen building.

This week in MD the weather has been much the same--cloud up, storm, then clear up. I love this kind of weather. We never had this in California, growing up. We'd get rainstorms, and the occiasional thunderstorm, but there was no regularity to it. So yes, I love thunderstorms. Especially when I can watch them from a window, safe and dry. My poor doggies hate them, though. Too loud!

Monday, monday...

Hi everyone!

Last week was fairly normal for me--work all day, have things to do all evening. I was able to be home for my dogs for three nights in a row, mostly due to one activity being at my house. Fortunately the friends that came over didn't mind the dogs being around--and the dogs were very well behaved, I must say. They just laid on the couch and watched.

Thursday night was book club--the discussion was rather circular, beginning and ending (for me at least, since I left when the subject was returned to) with potty training. Of course I had to share my one little thing, which is really Bill Cosby's routine about the monkeys in the sewers swiming around and coming up to tickle our bums, and couldn't even tell it right I was laughing so hard, but other than that, I really have not much to add to such conversations. The book discussion was about "A Woman in Berlin: Eight weeks in the conquered city" which I hadn't managed to finish, but got far enough that I could add to the discussion. When I was a teenager I read "The Hiding Place" and several other books about the Holocaust and different groups of people that were affected, but this is the first one I read that was concerned with Germans--the normal, every day people who were affected by what their leaders did. It was really good--and so well written it was hard to remember it wasn't fiction. Definitely recommend this one.

Friday night was the first meeting of Stake Conference, in the temple, on the seventh floor. It was really good. Of course you can't take notes in the temple, but I did write down what I remembered the next evening while waiting for the Saturday evening session. There were three things that stayed with me. One: to go to the temple more often (not hard in my current state of almost never going). Two: you can go to the temple to get something out of it for yourself, not just helping those that have gone on before. Three: whenever you have the chance to go to the temple, you should perform some ordinance there, not just show up and then leave without taking the opportunity to help others. That third one I took to heart that night. I knew I wouldn't be able to sit through a session without falling asleep, but I was able to do something else that helped five people. And I stayed awake :)

Saturday morning I cleaned and tried working with the dogs--that didn't work. Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon managed to escape the backyard for a few mintues. Fortunately they both came back to me, and given that it was Saturday morning there were no cars and mostly no people--and they didn't make any messes anywhere. They just ran around for a couple mintues then came when I called. I may be ready to try a dog park with them.

Saturday afternoon my friends S and C came up from VA, and we met up with D from work. We had lunch, then went to see Pirates of the Carribean 3. My review: it was good, but I can't say I liked the ending. The story, the effects, the music, all was what I have come to expect from the movies, and there were multiple Jack's, which is always good. Although there was less of Will in this movie, it seemed, so I, of course, didn't care for that so much. But I didn't really like how it ended. Or how they tied 19th Century pirates into ancient Greek mythology. I will, of course, get the DVD when it comes out, because I have to have the set, and I have to watch it again for the things I missed, so maybe I'll like it better after watching it a few more times.

Saturday evening was the evening session of Stake Conference. It was all about families and what a great responsibililty it is to be parents. Not a lot there for me, but I did manage to glean a few things out of it. Which are written in my notebook. Which is at home. Sunday morning was the main session of conference, for my ward and two others at least. I have to say it was a little odd for me. My normal Stake Conference experience is one of two things: I'm in the choir, or I'm sitting off to the side by myself. This time I wasn't in the choir (I'm about all choir'ed out for the moment, and they kept having rehearsals when I had other committments), and this time I was surrounded by friends from my ward. I got to hold two babies--not at the same time, of course--and it was really great. (ok, sappy moment alert) I just can't express how much it means to me that I have really been accepted by people in my ward. Yes, there's often not a lot of common ground (reference the potty training above), but that doesn't seem to matter. I don't think I've ever been in a place where I have felt like this, like I belong--not just allowed to participate. My poor little lonely heart is very greateful for all these freinds that are now in my life. Ok, sappy moment over. Crying at work not good.

After conference I went home, fixed one of my freezer meals (from the freezer meal group I'm a part of), read Harry Potter 1 and took a nap with the dogs, watched Farscape, and had my Home Teachers come over. The dogs didn't like them very much at first (they have never growled so much! I had to clap my hands at them to get them to stop), but they warmed up to Charlie by the end. Since I had given him treats to give the boys. We'll see if they remember him next time.

I hope everyone is happy and healthy. ttyl! (talk to you later)

My brain is fuzzy...

What a week!


Note to self: staying up late to read when you want to be up early to get to work on time the next day is NOT a good idea! I don't care if Harry *is* still stuck with the Dursleys!




Monday blew off FHE--actually not as bad as it sounds, because the family that signed up to have us come over forgot they'd signed us up, and I forgot to call and remind them a week before, and so since everyone forgot, I stayed home with my dogs. They liked that.



Tuesday some friends came over and we worked on quiet books. The dogs were funny. I tried to confine them in the kitchen, because it seemed cruel to me to lock them up downstairs, and they jumped through the barrier and joined us. Fortunately they like to lay on the couch and just *be* with us, so it was fine. My friends didn't mind, either. Silly doggies.



Wednesday I again stayed home, only this time I worked on my front yard. Heeding warnings that it was going to be hot and yucky I decided to mow, trim, cut, and sweep. The dogs were in the back yard for part of it, which makes me nervous because if they try hard enough they can get out of the gate (they've done it before). Then they were in the house, which makes me nervous because who knows what they'll get into if I'm not there to watch. But they were good, both places, and now my front yard looks like someone cares about it.



Thursday I went quickly home after work to walk and feed the dogs, and make a quick supper for myself. I had a Chiropracter appt, and I didn't want to tease the boys by coming home and then leaving again, so I went to PetSmart and spent another $70 on the dogs. I got them 'Gentle Leader' harnesses, so maybe I can break them of their pulling habit. At least when we're on walkies. I also picked up a couple more toys. Then I went to book club and read more in my car until time to go in (I'm still only about 1/2-way through the book). The book was "A woman in Berlin: 8 weeks in the conquered city". Very interesting, well-written, and tasteful description of the atrocities suffered by women in the city after the Russians conquered it in 1945. Definitely need to finish it. The discussion started out by the other women discussing potty training, then we talked about the book for a while, but when the conversation turned back to potty training I knew it was time for me to leave. Should I ever need a discussion on potty training, I'm sure there will be someone willing to discuss it with me. So I went home and let the dogs out, and they played in the back yard for a while. Obi-Wan is getting really rambunctious, while Qui-Gon has a much milder temperament.



Well, the rest of the week was filled in with work and sleep. sometimes at the same time (I fell asleep during a meeting on Tuesday--unfortunately it was a small meeting, and the guy running the meeting noticed, but he wasn't offended. He just teased me about it).



Since I've had the dogs my diet has been a bit out the window. However, I have managed not to gain any weight. I'm sure the additional exercise is helping with that.

15 mintues and too much to share...

It's been a while since I've written a 'journalistic' entry. In that time, I've managed to offend a few family members (since I have a blog I seem to feel that they should read it to find out about me), went to a Single Adult conference, had an epiphany, and met a family that might be willing to take my dogs.

So my family makes me crazy, but maybe I'm the one just going crazy because they don't do what I want them to. When they freely admit they don't read my blog because they don't have time then send me a silly 'spam' email I tend to think they're just not interested in my life and times. Why shoudl they be? I'm pretty boring, but I still manage to organize millions of ions about it.

I went to the Liberty SA conference in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, over Memorial Day weekend (instead of Star Wars Celebration IV--I guess my priorities have changed? Or maybe I just had no desire to stand in line all weekend (side joke--Celebration III was "In Line", Celebration IV was "Still in line"). Anyway, I'd been feeling like I lost my testimony of the Single Adult program, and really hoped that this conference would help me get some of that back. (The epiphany was about a week later when I realized it wasn't my testimony of the program that was suffering, it was me having to do all the work for my ward and for the stake. But that's a different story.) I went to the conference with my friend Tess, who wanted to stay an extra day and tour Philadelphia with her friend Nick, which we did. The conference was good--I've been the last three years, and it's always good. I wasn't feeling well so I didn't get what I was hoping for--in fact, I spent almost the whole time wishing I could just go home and lay on my bed. But I managed, and I also manged to get the guy I have a slight crush on to agree to come play piano for us at the Seneca Single Adult Conference so I get to see him again there :) He may think he's too old for me, but I don't think so. I think he's just right. Course, he plays the piano so wonderfully, I think that's where my crush started. Ah, but I digress. Tess and I had official Philly Cheesestakes at the same place where Sylvester Stalone filmed the movie Rocky (Nick told us we should be impressed), and we even went up the steps that he ran up in the movie and jumped in triumph. Yeah, I wasn't too impressed by that either. But there was a cool building nearby that kept changing from white to blue. Impressive, as Darth Vader would say. Oh, but the cheesestakes were everything I'd hoped they would be. YUM!

I picked up my dogs from the place where I had them boarded for the weekend on Wednesday, and they were like different dogs. Friendly and outgoing and basically cheerful. I started feeling bad that I may not be taking good enough care of them if they can go to this place over the weekend and come back so different. I seriously thought about letting the Dog Rescue place take them back to the Farm where they keep most of their dogs, but I did find out that place really isn't a good place for them. They're cared for, but there's almost no human interaction. So I still have them. I took them to an Adoption eveng on Saturday, and there was a family returning from a trip to the pool that met them. The family currently lives in the apartments above where the Adoption event was taking place, but they're having a house built, and have apparently discussed getting dogs. The girls, probably 10 and 8 or so, really loved my boys. They went right upstairs and looked them up online, and the older one started crying because the mom kept saying she had to talk to their dad first (he was away on business). I ran into the mother a little later, which is when I found this out. She was quite taken with them as well, and would like to take both of them. If I can just hold on until they can take them, I think this would be a good family for them.

Ok, I'm out of time so I can't pull out all the minute details and go through them at length, but truthfully I was quite the emotional mess last week, and this week I'm doing much better. Plus I got to hold Felicity's baby on Sunday! Yay! Baby-holding always helps!

Things that go THUMP!

One day my dogs were learning to go up and down stairs. They were getting pretty good at it, and would practice running up and down. To keep them on the same floor where I was, I shut the door at the top of the basement stairs. When it was time to go upstairs, I went up the stairs to open the door, but Qui-gon rushed ahead of me. Since it's quite dark in that particular stairway, you guessed it, THUMP!!! He turned around and ran downstairs tail between his legs. Took a few minutes (and me laughing all the time) for him to be ready to try THAT again!

Yesterday morning I decided to set up their pen around their crate to give them more room. I tied the pen to the crate, hoping they wouldn't chew through the twine I was using. I went upstairs, thinking to put my lunch together for work, listening to see if they would be ok. A few minutes went by, and then I hear this THUMP!! I go downstairs and both dogs had jumped over the 30-inch high pen, and were running around the downstairs, thinking themselves quite clever.

Dogs. Dogs definitely go THUMP!!