Jen

Some facts

2009-10-22T21:53:00.000-04:00

Work has been super, crazy busy. I sprained my finger last month, it still hurts. Had my first session of occupational therapy today. I'm saving for a Prius, but for the moment our credit card debt is still too high to divert any money elsewhere. We're watching the Yankees game, hoping that the Angels will meet the Phillies in the World Series. The Miami Hurricanes beat the FSU Seminoles this year, so the rest of this season's victory is gravy. We've seen some really cool shows lately, most recently Big Bad Voodoo Daddy at the beautiful Delaware Opera House. We bought their new album on LP . Our dogs are healthy. I haven't missed meetings or preaching days even though work has been really, I mean really stressful. The weather is remarkably pleasant, and the stars seem to love me as much as I love them. Our summer vacation in Maine and Quebec City was unforgettably enjoyable. We go to Trinidad next month to see the in-laws, and I'm genuinely looking forward to it. Our friends who don't already have babies, all seem to be expecting. Our 8th wedding anniversary was last month - he bought me a pretty bracelet that I wear almost every day, and I bought him some stone lions ("Singh" in Hindi = "lion") for the driveway, and he loves them. He gave me earrings too, but I discovered my holes have closed for the first time since I was five years old, when they were first pierced, so I won't be wearing those until I can re-open them. A little sad. I'm still wearing the watch he got me for our first anniversary, and the telescope I got as last year's gift still gets plenty of use. Did I mention that I've been working really hard? I'm not designed for 50+ hour work weeks. Mom and Dad are doing okay, going through their ups and downs just like the rest of us. My finger hurts again now... I'm going to stop typing. Missy, when you're blogging more than I am -- that's how I know it's been waaay too long since my last post here.

US Airways Checked Baggage Fees

2009-04-15T09:46:00.005-04:00

I should have expected it, but it disappointed me nonetheless. Yesterday I called US Airways Silver Preferred Customer Service line -- the line that is reserved the more frequent traveler, and I had this conversation:

Are there any exceptions to customers who are required to pay checked baggage fees?

Um, I'm not sure...

What about First Class passengers, or Dividend Miles Preferred members?

Oh, okay. I don't know about those. But please let me check.

[Seven minutes on hold; I hung up.]

This morning I simply searched for "US Airways checked baggage fees" and found a single page that laid out the whole policy, including exceptions, and found my answer in a few keystrokes. Yes, First Class passengers and Dividend Miles Preferred members ARE exempt from all checked baggage fees. And there are a bucketful of other exceptions.

Ah, the airlines' customer "service." I really hope that survival of the fittest works its magic in this industry.

What a relief

2009-02-23T15:24:00.002-05:00

My back is doing better, all of a sudden. I attribute this change in condition to the massage I got a little over a week ago. I can't believe it took such a little thing to make such a big difference, because I've spent so much money on so many BIG things that were all supposed to help. And the massage wasn't even my doctor's idea - it was mine. I got my first massage about six weeks ago, and I got a little relief for about two days. Nothing to write home about though; it was just another remedy that didn't help very much. Last week I was so tired of the pain that I was willing to spend the $100 even if all I got was another two days' of relief. But so far, it's been over a week already and the pain hasn't come back. Wow!

I still have considerable discomfort, but nothing like the pain I used to have. THIS is when I feel like I should be returning to work. The only reason I came off of Disability at the first of the year is because my job was at risk. I shouldn't have been working though - when you need narcotic pain relief just to function like a human, you shouldn't ALSO have to be chained to a desk 40+ hours a week. But now, finally, I feel like I can perform my job without numbing my body to do it. Here's hoping that it lasts.

A government strong enough

2009-02-23T14:55:00.002-05:00

I read quote today that reminded me of Joellyn's recent discussion of government. Here is the quote: A government big enough to give you everything you want, is strong enough to take everything you have (attributed to Thomas Jefferson). I only put my trust in a perfect government that has a pure motive and also has the power to exercise true wisdom and justice. There is no human government that can hope to earn my trust, and that's why I look to a heavenly kingdom that will rule over the earth.

Duncan is home from the hospital

2009-02-09T16:49:00.001-05:00

Great relief -- my dog Duncan has been released from the hospital.
The swelling on his brain has subsided, and now the concern is the
less-critical stuff. Like the healing that has to happen with the
stitches and the bruising on his face... watching out for infections
and the like. Totally manageable stuff. He's on pain medications
that make him very sleepy all the time, and antibiotics that make his
stomach upset. But he's eating well, so that helps prevent a lot of
the stomach irritation.

I'm so glad he made it. WHEW!

Duncan Had A Very Very Bad Day

2009-02-08T08:50:00.002-05:00

Yesterday afternoon Duncan was hit by a car, a little before 4 PM. The side of his head took most of the impact. We rushed him to the hospital where they worked to stop the brain from swelling further. The x-rays showed nothing broken (!) and no internal bleeding probably because his body wasn't hit - just his head really. This morning it appears that the swelling has stopped, but his one pupil is still dilated indicating he's not out of the woods yet. They have decided he's stable enough to endure the anesthesia he needs for stitching up his lip laceration. He urinated today, which is a good sign that his internal organs aren't failing.

It is so awful to feel responsible for this. And I wasn't even there - my mom feels more directly responsible although I've assured her that I don't feel that way towards her. My heart hurts for my dear doggie. I can't believe he's survived it, but I also can't believe that he still might not make it. The vet won't make any promises. I understand why, but I still wish he would. Could.

Why haven't we bought a fence - didn't we say the same thing last time something like this happened?? More updates to come...

Weekend Update

2009-01-19T18:48:00.001-05:00

What a weekend, oh my. After being on disability for four months, I
almost forgot what a whirlwind the weekends can be. I've been back at
work for two weeks now, and I can see that I am going to make a
concerted effort to schedule some relaxation into my Saturdays and
Sundays.

It all started on the Wednesday before the weekend, when I got my
second epidural steroid injection. It's a series of three injections,
spaced at one-month intervals. The first injection was a breeze,
relatively. The doctors told me that the injection itself would cause
increased pain for a couple of days but after that I should expect to
see some relief. It hurt a little bit, sure, but no more than any
other injection. It was like a flu shot, where the injection site is
tender for a little while but goes away within a few days. THIS time,
however, it's a whole different kind of pain. This is miserable. At
work I have doubled my dose of painkillers just to get through the
day. At the Kingdom Hall I can't sit in the chairs so I'm bringing
blankets and pillows so I can lay on the basement floor.

I went out with a group on Saturday to do some preaching. Because of
the brutally cold weather and the lack of sidewalks in the area, we
agreed to drive the car from house to house instead of walking. I
learned that this type of preaching is very hard on my back! I
climbed in and out of the car every five minutes for an hour. Despite
painkillers and plenty of rest afterward, I was a ball of jelly for
the rest of the day.

On Sunday I wanted to skip the meeting at the Kingdom Hall and just
use the telephone tie-in to hear the talk. I meditated on Proverbs
22:6 about rich blessings that we don't have to "pay for" in pain and
suffering. Yes, this principle cleared my conscience so that I had no
problem with my decision. Then suddenly I remembered that my friend
Kim had agreed to help with some shopping, but in order to get her
help I would have to go to the meeting first and we would be leaving
together. So I changed my mind and then felt a little guilty that a
shopping trip was "worth" the pain, but the rich blessings were not
enough on their own. I resolved this guilt by lying on the Hall's
basement floor again, receiving all the fine association and spiritual
food, and still preserving my strength for the shopping trip.

That was a long day. We had lunch and also bought furniture, window
treatments, rugs, lighting, and other decorating supplies for my
living room. Since I spent very little time sitting down, my back
didn't really hurt much until late in the afternoon. I came home and
ate dinner and watched football (stupid Ravens! stupid Eagles!) and
suddenly the weekend was over. I'm longing for the days past when
every day was a weekend.

And the pain goes on

2009-01-11T23:15:00.001-05:00

My doctors are still looking for the problem that explains all the back pain I'm experiencing. They've ruled out a lot of possibilities so far. So we know a lot about what it's not. I've tried tons of physical therapy, and chiropractic adjustments, and steroid injections, and massage therapy, and analgesic patches, and narcotics, and anti-inflammatories, and and and.... ugh.

I've also had two X-rays, three MRI's, and a CT scan. All the imaging studies show normal bones and normal vertebral discs. Only recently did one of the scans show a small spot on a nearby muscle - but thankfully not on the complicated spots like on the spinal cord or other nerve. It's kind of like having a freckle or a mole on your skin... it's an abnormality, but it's not worrisome. You examine it for the presence of this and that characteristic to see whether it's something worth worrying about. When those characteristics aren't present, then it's considered just a variation on normal.

In my case though, since this abnormality is accompanied by so much pain, it's definitely worth investigating. Ideally we hope it can be excised or drained with a simple procedure and all my pain will be gone. Wouldn't that be great! Really I don't know whether to place my hope in this treatment. Over the last several months I've heard about a lot of possibilities from my doctors; we won't know for a while if this is just one more thing to rule out.

I have returned to work. My back is only a little bit better than it's been for the past month or two, but I had to go back to work or I was risking the loss of my job. The atmosphere at my company is extremely unstable: they just began a series of layoffs a couple of days ago, with further major restructuring to come down the pike. Fun times.

My lower back is what started all of this back in August. It was from that improper lifting that I wrote about previously, as you might remember. Thankfully that part of my back feels perfectly healthy. It got better after four or five weeks of physical therapy, and that's why I tried to return to work back in September. When I think back on it, I now realize that it was my upper back that was hurting so badly at that time. It's just that the pain was so extensive that it was impossible to isolate.

My day at work is not easy. I am using a different chair that gives my back more support, and I spend as little time in it as I can. I look for opportunities to get up and walk to others' offices instead of calling them. Even so I need to take a painkiller by 11AM, and that relief lasts until about 3PM. At that point in the afternoon, I grit my teeth and try to forget about the pain until I can get home and lie down. I don't want to take a second dose of painkillers just to get past those last two hours because once I get home, I can have a normal evening with my family after I spend an hour or so lying down on the hard floor.

I do still have additional doctors I want to see, and a few more treatments to try. I am not yet willing to accept this as a lifetime condition!

A few things I learned today

2008-10-21T17:01:00.003-04:00

The etymology of "electrophoresis" is related to the etymology of "metaphor". Both contain the Greek root "pherein," meaning "to carry or bear." In science, electrophoresis is a technique where molecules are moved (where -phor = carried, borne) through a fluid by applying electric ("electro-")current. In literature, a metaphor is a short hand way of invoking the meaning of a simple thing to better understand a complex thing. For example if someone says, "life is a river" they don't mean that literally, but they are using a metaphor to "carry over" the meaning of what a river means to what life means. I never would have guessed! I really enjoy learning about words.

Insects have immune systems. http://www.sci.muni.cz/ksfz/imuno_hmyz_e.html
Insects also can heal some of their wounds and burns.
http://jeb.biologists.org/cgi/content/abstract/14/3/364

It's best to notarize your Advance Medical Directive even if your home state does not require it. This is because you could become incapacitated while traveling in another state with different laws, and you want your wishes to be enforceable no matter where you are.

My public radio station offers a nifty gizmo called a Radio Bookmark, which is a small, portable device that makes it simple to follow-up on the stories you don't want to forget. It "bookmarks" radio stories with the touch of a button. Later you plug it into your computer’s USB port and all your bookmarked stories appear. I have never heard of such a thing until today!

I am not the only one who wants to switch to Google Chrome, but can't do so until the Roboform application is made compatible.

Despite the debacles in recent years, election laws all over the country are still full of holes. I can't wait till next week when this moot court decision is announced: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=95924817

Several studies have proven that memories can be biased by the questions asked at the time of the memory's retrieval. Those studies are fascinating to read. The effect is so powerful that it occurs even when the subject knows that the interrogator is trying to trick them!

Those are just the things I remembered learning today. Surely there's lots of other information that got into my mind without me being aware of its entry. How awe-inspiring to have a thing so wonderful as a brain!

Update on my back injury

2008-09-17T09:46:00.004-04:00

It has been about a month since I first hurt my back. Last week I thought I could return to work. Boy was I wrong. I worked half-days in the office, then returned home to work in the afternoons. I was not very productive, and I managed to undo much of the progress I had made in physical therapy (PT).

Lots of friends and colleagues thought I was nuts for trying to go back to work. Here's why I wanted to try: My goal is to be able to return to work full time. That's where my road to recovery is supposed to end. When I began down the road, I made gradual progress at home until I was finally able to move around and to sit awhile without pain. It seemed like I had made all the progress I was going to make on this part of the road. The next step towards that ultimate goal would be to head back to work, and gradually make progress on that new part of the road. It turns out that I was simply not ready. My first day back was not too bad. The next day was harder. By the 4th day I wished I could stay home. The last day I called my doctor and told him I couldn't do this anymore. I had expected to find each day a little easier than the one before, but when that didn't happen I knew it was a mistake.

So now I've returned to disability and my full time job is to get better. I have PT three times a week, and until I went back to work it had delivered vast improvements for me. If I continue making progress like that, I shouldn't need any aggressive treatments. No injections, no surgeries... that's what I'm hoping for. I'll always have to be careful with my spine to avoid re-injuring it, but I really hope this will be an acute injury that won't become a chronic pain issue.

In addition, my company has agreed to buy whatever office chair my therapist recommends. Our standard office chairs are perfectly comfortable for healthy people, but not for injuries like mine. My mom suggested a great comeback for the smart remarks that are sure to come from coworkers who are sure to envy my new groovy chair: "I'd gladly trade you my chair for your healthy spine." So there. Remind them that this is not a luxury item -- and that it's not what I would have chosen. I'm totally planning to use that line.

Right now, without causing pain, I can do light housework, or sit with regular posture for about a half an hour, or sit in a recliner for about 3 hours (in 45-minute chunks), or stand for about an hour. If I do more than that, I become very uncomfortable and I have to lie down and rest for several hours. If I'm somewhere that I can not lie down, like when I was at work or if I'm driving, I have to take a painkiller to sustain me until I CAN lie down. Most days I don't need painkillers. Which is good for many reasons, one of which is that alcoholic beverages are contraindicated. Heh.

One thing I learned from Discovery Channel

2008-09-12T08:51:00.001-04:00

I was watching a show called Destroyed in Seconds on Discovery Channel, and they were discussing a fog-related pileup crash in California last year. I lived in California for eight years during my childhood. I knew that kind of weather - that thick fog that's thicker than any fog you've ever seen. But I was a kid, so it was fun in the fog; I didn't know how dangerous it was. By the time I was a driving teenager, we had moved out of California. So until I saw this TV show, my brain had never had the occasion to put my fog experience together with my driving experience. It was an odd experience to feel those memories touching each other during that TV show. How strange that many separate memories could put themselves together and produce anxiety in the present.

I also learned for the first time that this fog is so unique that it has a name: tule fog. Pronounced "TOOL-lee." Most of the photos I found, although they claimed to be tule fog photos, seemed like they were just regular fog photos. The photo here is more like what I remember. We always called it Merced fog, because Merced is the town we lived in.

One night in particular sticks out in my memory. Mom was driving, and my little brother and I were about 6 and 9 years old. We had all been visiting a friend's house that evening, about two miles from our house, and it was time to leave around 8:30 or 9:00. The roads were very familiar, very residential, and never very busy. During the day we were frequently allowed to ride our bikes to this friend's house. That drive took about a half an hour because we had to drive so slowly, and because we couldn't see any landmarks or street signs. At one point along the way, we stopped because my mom couldn't even see her hood ornament! The best part was when my brother had to climb up a street sign to find out whether this was our street. My mom couldn't see that sign from the ground, even though she got out of the car and walked over to the signpost. So she asked my brother to climb the pole and read it. It was unbelievable.

I remember having fog days from time to time. Schools would have delayed openings to wait for the fog to burn off. One of those mornings I asked my mom about it, because I didn't understand the danger. I could see enough to walk to the bus stop, what's the problem? She explained that cars wouldn't always see a little girl walking in fog like this. I had thought that as long as I could see them, I would know when it was safe to cross. Mercifully, she didn't dent my implicit trust of the bus driver's abilities by explaining that the drive itself was dangerous.

Fast-forward to the day I saw this Discovery Channel show. Again since the idea of driving in Merced fog was so new to me, I asked Mom what I should do in a situation like that. First, she said, DON'T DRIVE. If you're already driving, slow WAY down, but don't do it suddenly because the drivers behind won't detect the change in speed until it's too late.

Heavy Lifting

2008-09-04T09:13:00.002-04:00

A couple of weeks ago we had a septic backup into the basement. It was disgusting, and probably worthy of an entire blog post all its own. It was suddenly very important to get stuff out of the basement - stuff that is already wet and stuff that will soon get wet if it's not moved NOW. When boxes are soaked with yucky water, you tend to hold them away from your body. As everyone knows, this is not proper lifting technique. But it's exactly how I lifted those boxes.

I only carried a few things, because I hadn't been feeling very well that day. I had had breakfast and went back to sleep for half the day (I even missed the meeting), I woke up to help organize a few visits from the septic repair people, then ate dinner, then slept soundly all night again. The next morning was Monday, and without a working septic system, nobody got showers so we all stayed home from work. As soon as the repairman got it working again, I raced upstairs to bathe because I still felt filthy from the previous day's cleanup efforts. I sat on the shower floor to shave my legs, but that small stretch was the straw that broke the camel's back, though it was my back that stopped working.

I stayed in bed all day Monday, in pain but not emergency-room-level pain. The next morning the pain was equally bad, so I went to the doctor's. The problem was that I was home alone on Tuesday. I wouldn't leave my bedroom because it's the only place in the house that allows stair-free access to the toilet. In this condition I would need a ride to the doctor's office. I got in touch with someone from my congregation and the help swooped in quickly. Not only did I get a ride to the doctor in the middle of a weekday afternoon, but I got eight other visitors besides.

The doctor prescribed muscle relaxers and narcotic painkillers, and instructed me to take LOTS of Advil. Four times more than the labeled dosage instructions. The next day I got an x-ray, and an MRI a few days later. Results: two herniated discs in my lower back. Ugh. L4L5 and L5S1 will never be the same.

I have applied for short-term disability benefits (80% of my salary, wow!) and physical therapy has started. The therapy is exhausting. It doesn't hurt exactly, it just wipes my energy. In fact at this point, almost three weeks since the injury, I am free from pain most of the time. In order to return to work, I need to strengthen my muscles to permit longer periods of sitting. Right now I start feeling uncomfortable after sitting for 45 minutes. And "sitting" is a relative term these days. Really what I mean is leaning on a whole bunch of pillows with my feet on a stool. It's recliner-like sitting.

Right now, the plan is to visit the doctor tomorrow, regale him with tales of my astounding progress, and return to work on Monday. Let's see how it goes.

My favorite B&B

2008-08-15T18:10:00.004-04:00

Every year, the Maine Lobster Festival runs from Wednesday to Sunday to include the first Sunday in August. Well, that's how I *think* it goes every year, based on the two years I've known about it.

Last year we decided to go on the spur of the moment, and we couldn't find a nearby place to stay. I finally found a room at a bed-and-breakfast located forty minutes from the festival grounds. We loved that B&B so much that we booked it again for the 2008 Festival season.

Last year we went to the Festival on a Saturday, and this year we went on a Wednesday. Next year I'm hoping to go on BOTH Wednesday and Saturday. I think those days are the best days of the Festival because Wednesday is the first day of the Festival and they allow everyone in for free. All the other days you have to pay like $8 or $10 per person to get in; that's in addition to the money you spend on lobster and other stuff inside the Festival. And then Saturday is a pretty good day because they have lots of musical performances all day long. There's some music on each day really, but Saturday it runs non-stop and you can go from stage to stage and see all kinds of different musical stuff.

The Festival isn't a huge one. It doesn't feel too crowded to me. We find that in four leisurely hours there, we eat lots of perfectly-cooked lobster (only $38 for a triple lobster dinner!), eat a few other "festival food" items (like fried candy bars!), visit all the exhibits twice, buy a couple things, watch a performance or two, and by then we're ready to grab a beverage and go home. But despite its modest size, I love it.

I also love the unique experience of staying at a B&B. My discovery of the Festival last year was also my discovery of this type of lodging. I thought all B&B's were as awesome as Maple Hill Farm. On this year's trip however, I found out that some B&B's are "just okay." We stayed at a B&B near Bar Harbor, Maine for the second half of our vacation. It was a perfectly nice place, not particularly bad. But it was lacking some of the thoughtful touches that we love about Maple Hill Farm. We thought that these touches were unique to the B&B style; we didn't realize they were unique to Maple Hill Farm!

Here is a list of things that make Maple Hill Farm special to me:
- Huge 200+ acres to explore
- Green energy: solar panels and a wind turbine and accompanying gauges that we can gawk at right onsite
- Other green decisions too, like how most food scraps get fed to the chickens, and how shower supplies are served up in bulk pumps instead of little travel-size bottles
- Large inviting common areas
- Interesting and personable innkeepers Scott & Vince
- Working farm with funny llamas
- Delicious (and consistent) breakfast choices
- Free from light pollution makes for awesome stargazing
- Full bar service
- Separate kitchen facilities for B&B guests to refrigerate things, and supplied with travel mugs, silverware, barware, cookies, and always a surprise treat to eat
- Gourmet coffee flowing hot and fresh and free all day long
- Located in Hallowell and next to the state capital Augusta: towns that are small enough to feel small, but not so small that they're boring. Perfecly sized for our tastes.

The Bar Harbor B&B didn't have any of those things above. Not one! Since I'm such a picky eater, it was tough for me to accept a surprise "innkeeper's cooking experiment" greeting me each morning. This B&B did have its good points, I'll admit, but it's hard to remember those when I'm comparing the two places.

I'm sure every B&B owner would tell me that it's not entirely fair to compare one B&B to another. Each one has its own feel and flavor, with its own unique features. I agree with that completely, but I think that every B&B, regardless of its individuality, should have an abundance of "thoughtful touches." Things that give guests a genuine home-like feeling. Otherwise it just feels like a really nice hostel!

We've already booked our 2009 dates at the Maple Hill Farm.

The Great and the Good -- how I tell the difference

2008-08-09T13:14:00.003-04:00

They say the best way to find a good auto mechanic is by asking your friends for a recommendation. That's the method I used to find my mechanic Rich. He always tried to save me money, explaining when I could repair just one part of a system instead of replacing the whole system. And fixing just what I asked him to fix. So he's not one of those mechanics who will take the car in for a tire rotation and send you away with a $400 repair bill because of "finding" all kinds of additional problems. Rich takes it as a personal offense if he discovers that I've brought my car somewhere else for service. And he is located near my place of work, so he would drive me to and from work on the days that I brought my car into his shop for service.

This week I found out the hard way that Rich has retired, and he sold his business to a new guy who calls himself Sab. I brought my car into Sab anyway, since I may as well give him a chance to prove himself worthy in my eyes. I brought the car on Friday morning, reporting that the transmission seemed to be racing. Also it needed an oil change and a brake bulb replaced. I had bought the bulb already and gave it to him. An employee drove me to my work from the repair shop, just as Rich had always done. Nice! They called me after a while, said the transmission had no problems, and since they had completed the rest of the work, I could pick up my car now. "But wait," I said, "the transmission has been slipping every day for three years." If you're telling me there are "no problems" with it, then I KNOW you didn't test drive it. "Please test drive it and call me back. Maybe the problem isn't the transmission, but SOMETHING is wrong with my car. I know it's not running right -- find it and fix it."

A little while longer, they called back and said I could come pick it up. The shop sent a person to pick me up at work and bring me to the repair shop (again, nice!). My bill was $30 for the oil change and $10 for the bulb installation. Right THEN I knew I would not be coming back. Because you've already failed to find my car's most noticeable problem (the slipping transmission) and you've NOT identified the mystery problem that brought me here in the first place, and on top of all that, you're CHARGING me to install a bulb that I've supplied you with? Rich would never have charged for that! Not when I was already there as a paying customer! But I just kept it inside, quietly and privately deciding that this shop was nothing special. Cuz it's not like they've cheated me or anything -- they're not a BAD business. They're just not especially great. I paid the $40 total and drove back to finish my workday.

At work, they called again and said the mechanic had left a pair of pliers in my trunk, and asked if I could please bring the tool back. It didn't matter when, just any convenient time today; they were very apologetic. My decision to avoid this repair shop was confirmed again now on two counts: First, a great mechanic doesn't lose his tools, and Second, a great guy like Rich would have driven to ME in a situation like this; he wouldn't have asked me to come to HIM. So again, I kept these opinions to myself and just politely dropped off the pliers at the end of my day.

From the time I first picked up the car, exactly ten miles elapsed on my odometer when -- lo and behold -- the exhaust fell off my car and onto the street. Egads! I KNEW there had been something wrong! I had been driving around for three days with the exhaust pipes just barely holding on. And I had mistaken that sputtering sound for a transmission problem. But still, even with such an advanced state of deterioration, Sab's shop couldn't detect the problem at all. Wow.

I called for a tow, and got a Punjabi driver to come get me. He was a really fun guy to talk to, and he said he considered me as part of his family since I had the same last name as his. We drove about a half an hour to the shop near my house that fixed my exhaust LAST year. Sigh. It's broken again now, and I'm back to square one, in need of a great recommendation. They'd better fix it under warranty.
Time to start asking around.

Chicken Kitchen Mustard-n-Curry Sauce

2008-06-24T15:36:00.001-04:00

Recipe Adjustment Factor is 20 Times Original Amounts (Original Amounts in parentheses.)

Kitty’s Copycat Chicken Kitchen Mustard-n-Curry Sauce

4 cups mayonnaise(10 tsp)
1/2 cup yellow mustard(1 1/4 tsp)
3 Tbs + 1 tsp curry powder(1/2 tsp)
3/4 cup water(2 tsp)

Stir vigorously. Add water slowly, stirring until well mixed into the mayo-mustard-curry mix. Add more or less water, depending on how "runny" you want the sauce to be. Curry is to taste!

The most complex thing

2008-06-20T20:11:00.002-04:00

What is the most complex thing I can think of? "The human heart," I
thought wistfully. But no, I think the heart can be understood. It's
difficult of course, because the heart is desperate. And because a
relationship -- a connecting of two hearts -- doubles the
uncertainties. But some experts, even some laypeople, would argue that
they think they understand at least their own hearts - their motives,
dreams, and thoughts. So is that the MOST complex thing there is?

Maybe global problems are near the top of the list. Like natural
disasters, poverty, war, climate change, and such. Those problems,
individually and collectively, can not be solved without changing
hearts and minds, combined with extraordinary technological advances
that would also be needed. So, I guess, that's the same as saying the
complexity of every heart on earth would have to be added to the
complexity of the earth itself in order to measure the complexity of
these problems.

Maybe though, the most complex thing is one that we haven't even begun
to contemplate. Take the Universe as an example -- it's something
about which which human knowledge has huge gaps in understanding.
Gaps so huge that nobody can say even how huge. Now imagine a time
when all of those gaps are filled, and we come to find out everything
there is to know about the universe. ... It's impossible to imagine,
isn't it? Well for me it is. Maybe the most complex thing is
Imagination.

My Dream Vacation (well, really just my "Not-Nightmare" Vacation)

2008-06-10T22:39:00.001-04:00

I just had a great travel experience, which is rarer and rarer to hear about these days. And my trip could have gone wrong so many times, but I'd like to think it's my travel savvy-ness that protected me from a ruined trip.

It all started months ago when my father-in-law asked for my help to find a good price and to book him a hotel room. His stay went great, but that's not my story. I was attracted to the sales pitch given by the Ramada agent during that transaction. I ended up laying out $150 for a 3-day, 2-night vacation, which money would be refunded after I attended a 90-minute "vacation club" (=timeshare) presentation, along with the promise of hundreds of dollars in vouchers and rebates. I picked Ft Lauderdale as our destination since we love that area, and it would be a great way to escape the Northeast during the winter.

So yeah, I got a little bit suckered in, and many people tell me that timeshare companies readily give out more goodies than that... so I could have gotten a better deal maybe but it was painless in my case because I read the fine print. Turns out the package had a 9-month expiration date on it, so I had to use it before June 30th. Things were busy, projects at work kept us tied down at home all winter, and I didn't get to use it for an escape as I had hoped to do. But I knew I had to use it before the expiration date, so I reserved the room (but only after confirming that affordable flights were available for those dates -- more on that process below) and we set out on our trip with a couple of weeks before expiration. Oh, and when I reserved it, I declined their initial request for "only $49" per night to stay at the featured resort. I asked for a stay at the hotel that wasn't going to cost any extra. And then I checked that the hotel had a good reputation in the travel community, and that it wasn't a fleabag place in a dangerous neighborhood.

I pre-paid for our rental car on Priceline, which is my favorite travel site. But the best way to avoid disappointment with a service like theirs is to understand fully how their system works. I love www.betterbidding.com for the great Priceline guidance they give there, including an introductory post that gives advance warning of the common problems people have when they use Priceline without understanding it completely. Like the No Refund policy, etched in stone almost -- that one can really bite you if you're not expecting it!

I got a good price on Southwest for our flights, again a provider that works best when you understand what to expect. I researched my fare options for about an hour, selecting flight times that were realistic for our family (we don't do 7 AM traveling). I picked flights that had low-low-fare seats still available, because of being off-peak travel times for that route. Who besides a leisure traveler would be flying at 11:30 AM on a Tuesday from Ft Lauderdale? I refused to take anything but a non-stop flight to reduce the headaches caused by delays. We were fortunate that our flights both departed on time and landed early, but I was mentally, emotionally, and logistically prepared for delays. For example I purposely avoided taking the last flight of the day, which is a strategy recommended by many many travel advice columnists.

I read the Southwest website carefully to understand their boarding procedure, I printed my boarding pass early to get a good spot in the A boarding group, and I arrived at the airport early enough to eat a sit-down meal in the airport and didn't have to fly hungry. I brought my noise-canceling headphones. I divided our clothes between two checked bags so that the loss of one bag wouldn't leave one person with nothing; for the same reason I didn't check both bags under the same name. One was checked under his name and the other was under my name. I know the rules for getting through security at the airport, so I was able to comply without any difficulty. I had my eyes open for posted signs to inform me of any new or changed rules too. The TSA is still learning, I think, how to do what they do. They run pilot programs at select airports and you have to stay alert to detect whether YOUR trip through security is going to be a little different than it was the last time.

When we picked up the rental car, I declined their initial request for "only $7" extra per day for the great car that had been reserved "for me." No thank you, I want the car that I don't have to pay any extra money to rent. I paid what I've paid and I'm not going to pay any more. We also brought our portable GPS unit from home so that it wasn't at all tempting to pay $10 per day to rent one from the car company. Also decline the optional insurance -- it would cost me the same if I crash their car as if I had crashed my own car at home. Many personal auto policies cover rental cars the same as your own car. (Yeah, if you crash, the car company will charge other fees not covered by car insurance, but those fees could easily equal what the insurance coverage will cost.) And I always decline the fuel option. But I make that choice with my eyes open, knowing what I'll need to do to avoid any fuel fees. I've had to dispute fuel fees before, sometimes they're automatic and you can only get them removed by questioning them. To challenge the fee successfully, you're best off knowing what they will want to see: a full fuel gauge isn't enough - you'll do best if you have a receipt showing that you bought gas within the last hour and within 10 miles of the airport.

And at the rental car counter I also read all the signs they had posted. One of those signs explained how the automatic toll-paying transponder worked. If you go through the SunPass lane in your rental car, the transponder charges the toll to your account at the rental car company. But they charge $1.50 per day that you use it. That's the important bit of info that I got from the sign, because it's NOT on the window decal inside the car, the one that informs you (if you didn't know already) that the car is equipped with a SunPass device. In our case, it wasn't worth $1.50 to automate the payment of $3.00 in tolls. We just went through the cash lane instead, no big deal.

I read the rules for the timeshare-sponsored vacation, so I knew that we had to stop at a "Welcome Center" before proceeding to our hotel. Any questions I had for the reservations agent I asked for written confirmation by asking where these policies were already spelled out in writing on their site or in my paperwork. So I didn't have to endure any confusion about the reservation. I had researched this Vacation Club before attending their presentation, giving me the second of the two reasons I planned to use to evade the high-pressure sales team. My first reason to get out of ANY sales pitch is always that we have a family policy that purchase decisions like this are NEVER made in a single day. I didn't even have to pull out reason number two, which was that this specific company had a bad record with www.bbb.org -- over 300 unresolved complaints against them in the past year.

What would I have done differently? I would have confirmed the hotel arrangements by phone before traveling. I didn't have any problems THIS trip, but it's only a matter of time before a glitch in the system wreaks havoc on your plans. Especially when you're using a system as complex as the one I was using -- where the reservation is transferred between the timeshare company and the local hotel, payment is made through little voucher things, all kinds of things could go wrong. A phone call would usually uncover such problems while I still have a little time to fix them. And before we get wiped out from the traveling, grouchy from the hunger, tired from the delays, desperate to take whatever bed they'll offer...

Also I would have ignored some of the timeshare salesman's questions. I think the whole thing would have been over sooner if I answered "explain why you won't even test out the product with this no-obligation trial period" by ignoring the actual question and giving instead one of those two reasons I had already formulated. And keep using those reasons over and over to answer every question. Maybe that would have eased our exit a little better.

We did really like the concept of pre-paid vacations that they presented. Who knows, maybe one day we will buy a timeshare if it's as good as it seemed. But I'll first seek out advice from Timeshare Users Group at www.tug2.net and make sure I understand what I'm getting. Just like my experiences with this vacation, most things work better when your expectations are equal to or below what they'll actually be delivering.

My husband is, let's just say, "less savvy" than I am with these kinds of things. He appreciates that I take care of vacation arrangements in a way that saves money and still delivers a comfortable travel experience. He thinks I'm a genius, which is a nice ego boost but really I'm not. It's just that I read a few good travel blogs that keep me informed of the "gotchas" that are so prevalent in the travel industry. My favorite is www.elliott.org and I'll tell you why -- it's because he always ends the tale by explaining how the problem could have been avoided. So the only savvy I can rightly claim is that I learned lessons from the mistakes of others, instead of falling on to the hard lessons myself. If you ask me, that's a pretty good habit for enjoying life in general.

Grilling Accident

2008-05-27T12:13:00.001-04:00

Since yesterday was a public holiday with beautiful weather, we were puttering around the yard all morning till we were really hungry. Drove to the store and bought some meat, lit the grill, and it went BOOM! My husband clearly made some basic grilling safety errors, because the fireball made the grill jump back about 6 inches, he jumped about four feet back, and he got minor burns on his face and neck. His eyebrows, eyelashes, and forearm hair were singed too.

He was spared a lot of grief because he was wearing his eyeglasses and a baseball cap. Without the hat, his whole head could have caught fire. And if he'd been wearing contact lenses, they'd have burned too and there probably would have been a hospital visit. Thankfully the burns really were quite minor -- more annoying than dangerous. We took quick action which probably helped too -- he stood under the garden hose till the pain stopped and then he dried off and sprayed that blue gel aloe stuff on the burns. I advised him to spend the rest of the day out of the sun, since the heat would surely hurt like heck.

He refused to re-light the mean scary grill so he stood back while I got it going. He was giving me instructions the whole time too, demonstrating that he fully understands the theory of grilling safety. Just failed to put it into practice I suppose. The meat, however, tasted fabulous. Thanks mostly to the new remote grill thermometer we got for a cool $15 at BJ's.

Today he's doing well, but decided to work from home because it's difficult to wear a collared shirt and a tie when your collarbone and neck are burned. One thing that's really funny is that he now knows what a sunburn feels like. He has brown Indian skin that has protected him from UV his whole life, and he has never had a sunburn before!

Taxes are done

2008-04-06T17:41:00.001-04:00

I downloaded TaxAct today, intending to submit an extension of time to
file. If you've ever filed for an extension before, you know that you
still have to submit your estimated tax liability with your extension,
and for those of us with moderately simple taxes, it means you end up
really doing the whole thing in order to arrive at an estimate.

Plus you also have to check that you don't owe any taxes, since there
is no extension available for payment -- only for filing. A couple
years ago I got bit by that important distinction on my state taxes.
New Jersey doesn't require filing of a state extension, since the
federal extension is accepted by the state as the only paperwork
needed. I didn't owe any federal taxes so I didn't need to file an
extension for my federal return, even though I was filing late -- a
little-known rule, but it's true. Following so far? No federal
extension needed, so none filed.

When I did calculate my return, it turns out that we DID owe state
taxes! So we got a federal refund and were not penalized for filing
late (I told you that little rule was true). But the state wanted
$400+ and they wanted their late fees. What a waste of money.

So now I NEVER skip the extension paperwork even when I'm "sure" no
taxes are owed.

As a result of filing my taxes today, I found the first piece of
evidence that hints at a need for professional tax planning:
disallowed deductions. To avoid that situation next year, and to flee
from the Alternative Minimum Tax that's creeping up on us, I need more
guidance than software can give.

No excuses

2008-04-01T11:34:00.003-04:00

Wow, I'm an irregular blogger, aren't I? I have no excuse for the lapse, except for the thumb (you'll see - keep reading).

Here are a few highlights from my past 3 months:

- We adopted another dog: 6-yr-old Daisy, a Cavalier King Charles Spaniel, she's 15 pounds, retired from a breeder who surrendered her to a rescue group. She snores disruptively loudly, but otherwise is well adapted to life in our house.
- My husband got in a low-speed crash on an icy sideroad, and hit a utility pole. No injuries, and no damage except to his car. Took five weeks (!) for his car to get repaired. Total repair + car rental bill was about $10,000, thank goodness all was covered by insurance.
- Got tendinitis in my right thumb, was crippled for two weeks but all better now. What a stupid thing I did; maybe I'll tell you about it someday.
- I've selected a Subaru Tribeca for my next car -- it has exceptional reliability and the highest crashworthiness ratings (as specified in this earlier post). It's not tops in the SUV fuel-efficiency department, but is beat only by Subaru Forester which is just too station-wagon-ugly.
- Thanks to spring cleaning day at church, I got help assembling and learning how to use the pressure-washer I bought last year. Now we'll get to wash the green off our siding this spring.
- I love spring, and have been markedly more joyful since our daffodils bloomed.
- Work has been extremely busy but satisfying.
- My parents have been snowbirding in Florida.
- The wallpaper we don't want is still on all our room walls, but half-torn off because we got ambitious before we knew we'd need additional equipment. I've heard it's easy to remove but is just tedious and messy... I think I'll call a wallpaper party and bring over some people who have done it before.
- We discovered the world's best sushi and it's been hard to stay away, excepting the $80 bill for two of us.

I'm Shopping for a Car

2008-01-08T11:33:00.000-05:00

My car is a 1998 Honda Civic with 110,000 miles on it. The transmission has been slipping since July 2005, but I drive it gently and have kept it from deteriorating further.

My husband's car is a 2004 Lexus ES330 that he loves. It will be paid off in late 2008, so that's when I plan to buy my next car. This way we avoid making two car payments at any given time. Smart, huh?

I think I have the best method for selecting a car. I start at www.iihs.org (Insurance Institute for Highway Safety) to find their "Top Safety Award Winners." My search will be limited to these vehicles -- if it's not among the safest cars on the road, I'm not interested. Incidentally, their list is dominated by small- and medium-sized SUV's, so it looks like this will be the style I'm most likely to end up with.

Then I go to the library to review Consumer Reports reliability ratings for these models. If it doesn't have exceptional reliability according to Consumer Reports, then it gets cut off my list.

The cars that remain are the safest, most reliable cars made in 2006-2008. From there I will use fuel efficiency as a tiebreaker. I'll report back here with my final results.

Hot Buttered Rum

2007-12-04T19:31:00.000-05:00

My gal Elaina mentioned Hot Buttered Rum in her most recent blog post, and I couldn't stop thinking about it after that. I found a manageable recipe online -- from Emeril, no less -- and went home to prepare it. Alas, no whole nutmeg in our house. Borrowed some from a neighbor, did a quick Google search to learn how to use whole nutmeg (I didn't even know my grater had a "fine" mode), and went to town. I had to substitute the dark rum in the recipe for the light rum on our shelf. It smelled great, but tasted watery and too alcohol-y strong.

Tonight I tried again using milk instead of water, and using less rum. Oh, and dark rum this time! Mmmm, mmmm, good!

Massive Keyboard Driver

2007-10-08T16:17:00.000-04:00

Given that subject line, you might hope I'm going to tell you about a driver for a large, heavy, oversized, or otherwise BIG keyboard.

But no, I'm talking about the driver itself that is massive. 74 MEGABYTES for a keyboard driver? What kind of programmer writes this bloated stuff??

It's not like this is a fancy-schmancy special/technical/biometric/multi-language keyboard. It's just a regular keyboard with a few multimedia buttons:

Just Wow.

Much activity lately!

2007-09-12T12:38:00.000-04:00

It's been a very busy couple of weeks!

Monday 3-Sept - Labor Day we went to the Shore, splashed in the ocean, laid on the beach, and went to dinner at PF Chang's in Atlantic City. I get to eat at PF Chang's from time to time because of business trips, and I love the food, but it was more enjoyable this time because my mom & husband had never been there before.

Tuesday & Wednesday 4-5 Sept - Quick trip to Winnipeg for a business trip. It went great, after solving a technology disaster. I needed a serial connection to demonstrate the equipment I had brought but it turns out that my laptop has no serial port! My testing had all been done at my desk at work - where the docking station has a serial connection - so I never noticed that the laptop itself was serial-free. We drove around Winnipeg trying a few different solutions, and after 90 minutes we had a USB-to-serial cable that worked.

My travel was smooth, despite being booked on Northwest Airlines and being forced to connect through Minneapolis. On the return trip, while sitting in a Minneapolis airport bar for the two-hour layover, I finished the paperback I had brought with me. I was so disgusted with it by the time I was through - after finishing the last page I slammed it closed and dropped it on the bar. I didn't even want to take the book home with me. So I told the bartender that it was such an "exciting" ending that I was too exhausted to take it home, so he should give it away to someone. I was afraid if I told the whole truth he wouldn't want to offer such an awful book to anyone. The book was Bee Season, by the way. It started out so normal (which parallels the storyline, which starts out as a normal life for all of the central characters) but devolved into some kind of spiritual-searching-craziness. There were elements of it that I really liked, such as the family members who are each searching for meaning in their disconnected lives without realizing that the other family members are searching elsewhere. Though not a main part of the storyline, the discussions of sex were unnecessarily graphic. My bartender said he would give it to his wife. I'm glad I paid only five dollars for it at a used bookstore.

Thursday 6-Sept - When I got back to the office, my computer couldn't get an IP address --> means I couldn't connect to the network. After a few attempts at solving it myself, I was forced to call our MIS guy for help. He decides the best thing to do is uninstall all unauthorized applications because they could be interfering. Excuse me, but I've had those apps for months without a problem. I changed two things while in Winnipeg, and we've already reversed one of those things. How about we try reversing the 2nd thing first, before resorting to drastic measures? At this point he was frustrated by my defiance and he left. A couple minutes later his underling tech guy came to carry out the uninstall orders given by the first guy. I made him wait while I tried my solution, and it worked! So my unauthorized apps are safe, and my shiny new USB-to-serial cable is not. Well I'll keep it for the future offsite demos, but I'll have to uninstall its nasty driver every time.

Saturday 8-Sept - Two congregation picnics to attend, one for my current congregation and the other for my previous congregation. Both were fabulous fun. The first one was a pig roast (yum!) and was mostly friends gabbing with each other. I napped in their hammock for a short while, played catch with a football until I got tired, and participated in the gabbing. The second picnic had baseball (great photo ops) and other sports, including a pool. I joined in a late volleyball game only after I saw that I was equal to everyone else in my lack of skill, and had a bunch of odd sore muscles for two days.

The drive home took us past the town's "Community Day" festival, which I skipped only because of the picnics. By the time we drove by, around 8:30 PM, the party was kickin' with food, music, crafts, crowds, and fireworks. What a shame to be too exhausted to go! When we turned onto our street, we saw fire in someone's backyard -- thought it was a bonfire at first, until we got closer and saw it was clearly not on purpose. Flames were 15+ feet high! The SUV in front of us slowed down to study the situation too, and we decided to call 911. One of the questions they asked was whether anyone was at home -- so they'd know whether to send help for burned people. We didn't know - so hubby and I walked to the door and I banged on it and rang the bell with urgency: "bang bang bang, ring ring ring, bang bang bang, ring ring ring," and so on until someone opened the door. The lady looked annoyed, and I found myself speechless. My husband coolly stated "there's a fire behind your house" just as her husband joined her at the door, so he ran out the door to check it out. The fire department took a long time to arrive because the trucks weren't at the station a few hundred feet away, the equipment was all at the Community Day festival several miles away. We got to chat with the young family while we all watched the fire submit to the professionals. We all speculated that someone must have dropped a cigarette or something while they traveled on the railroad tracks that run behind the yard. The fire-woman sprayed for a long time to make sure it wouldn't re-start from an ember later. When it was all over, the family's winter woodpiles were burned up along with a 10-foot section of fence. No damage to the house thankfully, but it could easily have gotten out of control quickly and spread through the wooded yard if nobody had called for help. Our area doesn't have fire hydrants (everyone has private wells) so it was my first time seeing a fire-department tanker truck. We were all wound up from the excitement and it was very hard to wake up the next day.

Sunday 9-Sept - Went to church in the morning, where we had some fun visitors: the family who sold us our house! They had been in this congregation for 20+ years so they were very happy to visit. They had come back to the area for his dad's wedding -- at 80 years old he surprised everyone by getting married again! My mom was exhausted from the night before and didn't wake up in time to come -- she was so disappointed that she missed the fun.

Tuesday 11-Sept -- Mom made Indian food, and we all loved it. Her best efforts yet!

Our wedding anniversary is this Saturday the 15th. We have reservations in a happenin' restaurant in Old City area of Philadelphia - the same place we went last year. Since hubby didn't reserve our seats until last week, we have a 5:15 dinner date. Oh well, the bright side is we won't be exhausted at the end of the evening! I wonder if he'll want to see King Tut exhibit while it's still in town.

I'm not an alcoholic

2007-07-25T09:49:00.000-04:00

I've been dealing with a few un-bloggable personal problems lately. I now understand why people retreat to the bottle as a coping mechanism. I see how alcohol provides an escape. In the past few weeks, I noticed I was drinking for all the wrong reasons. I've not gotten drunk, but my motivation was definitely wrong. So yesterday I consciously decided to drink no alcohol, and went on a bike ride instead. The experts always recommend exercise as a healthy way to handle stress, and I expected it to be a little bit incomplete. Like when they say you should snack on carrot sticks instead of carrot cake, it's just not the same. I was pleasantly surprised to see that exercise really is effective -- even better than alcohol.

Therefore, I see two reasons that I can proclaim my non-dependency:
1) I recognized when alcohol was becoming a problem for me
2) I found a healthier way to handle the urge to drink

Now all I have to do is maintain the good habit.