I'll Take It!

Since Son Brian is getting married this May, I get to be a MOG (Mother of the Groom). Of course I need a dress for the occasion. As per wedding etiquette, the bride's mom got to decide on her dress style and color first; it's my job to find something fabulous that will coordinate with her.

The whole dress process is pretty intimidating. I'm not a formal wear type of person, and I don't want to spend an exorbitant amount of money on a dress I'll only wear once. Last week I was discussing the topic with a friend. She mentioned a bridal store not far from my house that was closing and selling off all their inventory. I decided to go check it out.

The front door of the store opened into a main reception area, with several rooms branching off it. The salesclerk directed me to the correct room, told me everything in there was 50 percent off, and let me look around. The selection was pretty picked over, but I found two that were my size and an appropriate color. The clerk put both dresses in a room for me and told me to let her know if I needed help.

When she closed the dressing room door, I took a closer look at the two dresses. Neither of them were what I was looking for. They were strapless, with enough boning to be able to stand up on their own, and loaded with sparkles. Not exactly appropriate for an outdoor semi-casual wedding. Even at half price, they were substantially more than I wanted to spend. The original price for one of them was as much as our house payment used to be!

I hung the dresses back up, and started to say goodbye to the salesclerk. However, I noticed a selection of dresses in one of the other rooms that looked interesting. They were much less formal, appropriate for a prom, a bridesmaid, or an outdoor semi-casual wedding. I was excited when I found nice tea-length one in an appropriate color and size, and thrilled when it I tried it on. Except for a few minor changes (raising the too-low-for-my-taste front, taking in the sides a bit, and adding a shawl or stole for warmth) it was exactly what I was looking for.

The dresses in the second room were one of two price points, anywhere between 50% and 90% off the original price. I was expecting to pay the higher of the two prices, but was ecstatic when it ended up being the lower. I've bought lunches that were more expensive than the dress!

The dress was being sold "as is" with no returns allowed. That caused me to stop and think, but only for a minute. I got a wonderful dress for a great price. The money I saved can go towards all the other extras...undergarments, shoes, jewelry, purse...that I'll need to complete the outfit.

A Thought For The Day

Give Me Liberty

Yesterday when I was driving to work I saw a strange sight along Manchester Road. There was a man dressed as a Statue of Liberty dancing on the sidewalk by a strip mall. The man wore a light green "robe" and a Liberty headdress, and looked like he was having a great time dancing and waving to the cars as they went by. I gave him a friendly honk and he waved at me and danced even harder. I looked in my rear view mirror, and saw him giving the pickup behind me a trucker "honk-the-horn gesture".

There was someone dancing there again this morning, and on the way home there were two dancing Liberties! I had to know why they were there, so I pulled into the parking lot. At the end of the strip mall was a sign that said Liberty Tax Service. Turns out that Liberty Tax Service is a nationwide franchise of tax preparers. One of their marketing strategies is to have people dressed as Uncle Sam and Lady Liberty dance on a sidewalk or street corner to attract customers. I guess that means I'll continue to see Lad Liberty till Tax Day in April.

If you haven't seen the Liberty dancers, here's a video of some from Atlanta:

Jammies!

One of the things I love about working with preschool children is that there's always a chance to be silly. Today was one of them; it was pajama day in our classroom. The teacher has been promoting this to the students for almost a week so they'd get pumped up about it. Everyone showed up today in their pajamas, carrying a pillow and their favorite stuffed animal.

All the adults working in the classroom were taking part in the day as well. I had to find something to wear; my comfortable, knee-length nightgown would leave my legs exposed, and the temperature's too cold for that. On a trip to Goodwill last week I found a silky polyester pajama set. It had a vaguely Oriental style print of electric blue. black, and gold on a midnight blue background. Quite comfortable and elegant!

When I rolled out of bed this morning I put ON my pajamas and a pair of tennis shoes,because my slippers aren't made for wearing outside. When I went out to get the newspaper I realized that the polyester material was not made for cold weather; the cold wind whipped right through it. BRRRR!

On Tuesdays I go to work early for a classroom team meeting, leave and go to the gym, then come back to start my scheduled work day just before lunch. We're not the first class to wear their sleepwear to school, so all of the other staff knew why we were dressed differently today. However, when I got to the gym a couple of women in the locker room gave me funny looks. The first few times I explained, but then I decided it would be more fun just to keep people guessing. After my workout I showered, dressed, and walked out to my car proudly showing my silky outfit. I stopped by the library to check my e-mail before work, where I noticed that the man at the next computer kept sneaking glances at my outfit. I didn't say anything.

Many of the activities today took the day's theme into account. The students squeezed orange juice and made cinnamon rolls for a snack, and took their stuffed animals with them when they laid down for quiet time after lunch. In the afternoon I got to supervise pillow fights between small groups of children. All too soon the day was over.

On the way home from work I stopped at a restaurant for a bagel with cream cheese and a cup of coffee. It was great to have breakfast food in the middle of the afternoon. Why not? I still had my pajamas on!

Send A Message

When I stretched out on the couch in the family room and fired up my laptop after work, I was going to quickly check my e-mail and log off. I wasn't planning on spending a lot of time on the computer. Pepper the cat had other plans, though. He jumped up on the couch, looked disdainfully at the computer taking up the prime lap real estate on my lap, and curled up on the bottom part of my legs. I interpreted that as a sign he was giving me permission to do some serious computer time wasting!

Monk-e-mail (sponsored by CareerBuilder.com) is a great Website that allows you to do just that. It allows you to send people funny e-mails from one of three primates--The Boss, The Coworker, or The Receptionist. You can personalize the monkey's headgear, clothes, and accessories, and choose a location backdrop.

After the primate is styled to your satisfaction, there are four different ways to add audio: using one of several pre-recorded messages, typing text (200 characters or less) which is translated to speech in one of the four available voice options, recording your voice by phone, or using the computer microphone to do the recording. The monkey's lips move as your message is "spoken"

When you're done, you can send it, or post it on Twitter but (strangely enough) none of the other social media sites.

The Right Note

The weather this week...

• Cloudy
• Foggy
• Foggy
• Foggy and light rain
• Rain
  

Even though it was dry today, it was yet another in a string of gloomy days. I needed something to perk me up, so this afternoon I was browsing in a "natural" body products store. On an end cap I saw a selection of interesting-looking fragrances that were new to me-the Demeter Fragrance Library.

I'm not a big user of scents or perfumes; they usually give me a headache. The names of these intrigued me, though. They were all based on "everyday" scents. I saw things like Fuzzy Naval, Laundromat, Pink Lemonade, Snow, Dirt, and Wet Garden.

All the scents sounded fascinating, but today the spring-like ones were especially appealing, so I used the tester to spritz a small amount of Wet Garden on my wrist. It was wonderful. There were notes of flowers, wet soil, and wood mulch; all the smells when you walk outside in the garden after a rainfall. I left the store in a much better mood than I went in. The scent didn't last on my skin very long, but made me happy every time I got a whiff of it.

The Demeter Website indicated that the store I saw just a small selection of the available fragrances. Some of them commonplace (Apple Blossom and Patchouli), some were bizarre (Funeral Home and Cannabis Flower), and others would be interesting to smell (Crayon or Bonfire).

Make A Change

I got a awesome notebook computer at Christmas. It's thin and lightweight, with a battery that lasts a long time. It's been great fun writing, surfing the Web, and playing games while sitting on the couch in the family room.

The computer came with a Windows Vista operating system, but a few weeks ago I upgraded to Windows 7. After I did the upgrade, my CD drive wasn't working anymore. I've been exchanging e-mails with the company's Technical Support office. They give me a suggestion. I try it, get excited when it looks like it might work, frustrated when it doesn't, then I e-mail them back and the dance continues. Last night their advice (complete with step-by-step instructions) was to make some changes to the computer registry.

That scared me. Now because I didn't think they knew what they were doing, but because I wasn't sure if I knew what I was doing. I know that if you mess up the registry, Windows won't work, and I didn't want that to happen to my new toy. I kept procrastinating on the job until there wasn't enough time to do it before bed. When I got home from work today, I decided to put on my big girl pants and tackle the project.

The first step was to back up the registry before I modified it, so I could go back to the original if I made a mistake. The Microsoft website told me how to do it; soon it was saved and I was ready to move on to the main project. I printed out the directions and set them on the kitchen table next to the computer. Carefully, triple-checking each step, I did what they told me to do, ending with shutting down and restarting the computer.

It restarted fine, and doesn't seem to have any big problems. Well, there is one...the CD drive STILL doesn't work! I updated Technical Support, and I'll wait to see what the next step is. The dance continues.

The Beautiful Color Of Love

I heard this lovely poem at church today:

The Beautiful Color of Love

What color is God,
Asked the child with skin so fair
Is he white like me,
Does he have light hair

Is God dark like me,
Asked the child with skin of golden hue
Has he hair that's dark and curly,
Are his eyes black or blue

I think God is red like me,
The Indian boy is heard to say
He wears a crown of feathers,
And turns our nights to day

Each one of us knows that God is there,
In all the colors above
But be sure of this, the one color he is,
Is the beautiful color of love

So when your soul goes to Heaven,
When your life comes to its end
He will be waiting, and his hand to you
Will he extend.

There will be no colors in Heaven,
Everyone will be the same.
You will only be judged by your earthly deeds,
Not your color or your name

So when your time comes,
And you see God in his Heaven above,
Then you will see the only color that counts,
The beautiful color of love

Alana Simpkins (from Poemhunter.com)

What A Difference A Day Makes

This is what out kitchen looked like last night when we went to bed:


And this is what it looks like now:


We have new countertops!

Last month we signed a contract to have the work done, and I went to the warehouse to pick out the slabs. Someone came to the house last week to make a detailed drawing for the fabricator, who would cut the stone. He left before I remembered to ask him how long the fabrication process took, so I was pleasantly surprised when I received a call about installation on Thursday.

The installation job is a multi-step process. Last night after dinner we had the old countertops taken out, along with the sink and its plumbing. That left us with no water in the kitchen. (Fortunately we have a wet bar in the family room that proved handy for making coffee at breakfast.) This morning a crew of three young men came to install the new counter, which only took them a couple of hours. Tomorrow morning the water lines will get reinstalled, along with a new faucet, and the job will be completely done.

I absolutely love the Cafe Amazonia granite we chose. It wasn't my first pick, but the salesperson told me it would look great, and she was right. You know how one home improvement project usually leads to another? I'm starting to compile a list of things that need to be redone now...

Figuring It Out

It turns out my voice was no better when I woke up today than when I went to bed last night. I still felt ok, but when I opened my mouth not much came out.

If I had a desk job with no need to talk to anyone, I could have gone to work today with no problem. However, according to the day's lesson plan my activities included playing games with small groups, singing songs, and supervising a Play-Doh table at quiet time-all things that required talking. I left a very scratchy voice mail for the preschool office manager and an email for my classroom teacher and the school director saying I wouldn't be there.

Now what? I've never taken a sick day when I wasn't completely under the weather. When the boys were young, the house rule was if you're too sick to go to school, you're too sick to leave the house. If I followed that edict, any type of errands were out. By 9:30 I had caught up on all my e-mails, straightened the kitchen and family room, watered the plants, and completely read the newspaper. I opened the refrigerator later in the morning and noticed it was right-before-payday empty, so I took out all the shelves and gave it a good cleaning.

In an effort to make myself better, I kept gargling with vinegar, doing comparison taste tests of the five different types in the house. (In my opinion, balsamic is the best, but the rice wine was a close second). I occasionally tried speaking a sentence on the cats to see how I was doing; the results weren't pretty.

After lunch there was an e-mail in my Inbox that told me I had a comment on a blog post from some time back. However, I couldn't read the comment because it was in a foreign language that looked like Chinese! The comment needed moderation before it could be posted. Was it a real comment or spam? The comment was connected to a Blogger user profile that looked normal; the profile was connected to a blog that was written in the same unfamiliar language. Before I just deleted the comment, I wanted to know what it said. I turned to the all-encompassing Google to help me.

I used the translator function of iGoogle. Under the more drop-down list is a handy Translator gadget. You add text or a URL, click the Translate button, and if it's written in one of the 34 supported languages you get an answer back! My comment was interpreted as:

To continuously update go you!! I wish you a happy mood

I doubt the translation was perfect, but at least I had a general idea of the message, and let the posting go through. So, Sister, if you get back to my blog, thanks for making my day a little more interesting.