Is this educational?

I had mandatory transfer student orientation at the U today. Here are some things that I learned:

1: It is way too hot in the Union Building at the U.

2: When the academic advisor came and began talking to the transfer nursing students about things I already knew, and in fact had already done (if it was the game of Monopoly, he was explaining "go" and I've already been around the board twice, collecting property), I excused myself. 10 minutes later, as I sat off to the side eating my sandwich, they started talking about clinicals, which is the stuff I really wanted to know.

3: (Completely off topic) I have a functionally accurate gay-dar.

4: Being accepted into the College of Nursing is apparently not the same as having declared Nursing as a major. This makes it difficult (okay, impossible) to register for the classes I need for Summer semester.

5: My inner teenager still checks out guys on campus.

6: If you lock your keys in your car at the U, they will come and help you get them out for free. The guys that do it are from Campus Security. They are a separate entity from the Parking Police.

7: It is okay to call the Parking Police the "Parking Gestapo." I have it on authority from the security guy who opened my car for me that they are that bad.

8: Sitting at a table, reading, facing a huge window and snow covered campus, is officially one of the coolest things I will do today.

Will I get credit towards graduation for these things I've learned?

I just gotta say

I'm not a fan of our government. I am a bipartisan politician hater. I long for a symbol as clear as a box of tea to dump into a harbor to register my discontent. Failing that, I offer these words, originally offered before there even was a United States of America:

"If ye love wealth greater than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest for freedom, go home and leave us in peace. We seek not your council nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen."

Samuel Adams

We have the leaders that we have -in both parties- because people want to be taken care of. They'd rather have an illusory security net than seek their own best level of ability. In doing so, they drag their country men down with them, as they seek, sustain and elect men and women who relish only power.

It was a nice country while it lasted. I don't know whether to hope that those who prayed for it and worked for it are punished by the socialist nightmare that we are rapidly becoming, or to hope that some one (not a government official) will find happiness in it.

I've just recently finished reading "Animal Farm." It is intended to mirror the atrocities and ironies of the Russian Communist revolution - they threw off one set of shackles only to accept the same again from a new master. Some hate the book; I loved it, likely because it tallies so well with my negative opinion of people's ability to endure liberty.

How Sweet It Is

I don't have very long; we are going to have family home evening tonight with another family. I just have enough time to say that I am typing this extremely short blog on our brand new lap top computer.

I must admit, I have been wanting one for a while, but it seemed like such a frivolous thing. Now that I am definitely in nursing school, and since Sweetie is ward clerk, responsible for the minutes of every meeting he attends, a lap top has just risen -meteorically- to the top of the list "Things we don't have to try as hard to justify buying."

On a completely different note, but still just as sweet, I found out that school starts a month later than I thought it did. This will give me more time to pray for education funding, and to get my house in order before I'm too busy to notice or care.

Why is it?

Why is it that kids who need love the most are the hardest to love?

Why is it that the time I decide I don't want to answer the phone is the time that I should?

Why is it that we delay doing things that we know we should do, even though we know that doing them later isn't going to be any more convenient, plus we pack around "lazy" guilt?

Why is it that the day I most need a nap is also the day I am guaranteed not to be able to get one?

Why is it that I have a cell phone for emergencies, but when I actually have an emergency, I either 1) don't have the cell or 2) it isn't charged?

Why is it that whining about these things never even makes me feel better?

I made it

I just found out this morning:

I was accepted into the nursing program at the U of U!

Let the chaos begin!!

Excuse me, please; I have to go take a drug test.

What's a Mother to do?

Jake loves earning money. Jake loves spending money. Jake is money motivated. Jake has purchased for himself, on-line, two prized possessions: a Denver Broncos Champ Bailey jersey, and an MP3.

He came to me before breakfast to ask if I had seen the jersey. (Of course not; I don't wear it, and I don't wash it.) I recommended that he look behind the lower of the two bunk beds; he likes to sleep shirtless, and if he took it off, it could have slid down two layers. Glory be to my brain, lo and behold, there it was. (No, he didn't say thanks.)

On to the MP3. It was the joy of his life; it had a large screen, you could detatch the earbuds and share, because it had a mini speaker. I could listen to talk radio in the car, and he could plug in to his own musical world (which sounds amazingly like the hard rock world of the 80's, actually). He loved it.

He came to me after breakfast this morning to show me a cracked LED screen. It no longer works. It cost him $50 to order on-line, and I think he's had it for 3 months. He's heart broken, in an extremely manly kind of way.

There are two mothers in my mind. There is My Mother, which longs to come out with the "It's a bummer when we don't take care of things, isn't it?" lecture, and there is the Me Mother, which wants to wave a magic wand and restore his MP3 to functional condition, objectionable Scorpion music and all.

The irony is that it was just last night that we read Job 1 for family scripture study. In one hour, Job loses all of his sheep, camels, and oxen (in excess of 11,000 animals) and his 10 children. His reaction was to rend his clothing, and say "Naked came I into the world, and naked will I go out. The Lord gave and the Lord hath taken away, blessed be the name of the Lord." But as I was driving him to the bus stop this morning, I just couldn't bring myself to remind him of Job. He's 12, which means he is also the world's most brillian person (all current evidence to the contrary not to be considered as relevant, of course). There is only so much sullen resentment a woman can take.

I'll try and talk to him after school, when maybe his world won't be quite so many ashes.

There's more than one way to skin a cat

Here is the blouse that Addie got for her White Top, Black Bottom, Look Nice orchestra uniform. I made the blouse myself. So there, obnoxious pattern designer.


On a complete tangent, isn't Addie pretty? I can say that because it is the product of genetic chance; I had nothing to do with it.

Reasons I am glad to be unemployed

5. I like the idea that I can go back to bed and catch up on any sleep I lost last night (even though I don't actually do it. The idea itself is good enough).

4. Making sure that Lizzie goes out the door to school with clean clothes and brushed hair; she looks like someone at home loves her.

3. I could have gone to the library yesterday (my day off) but I went today instead, just because I was originally supposed to work today.

2. Don't tell Honey, but I watched 2 1/4 episodes of "Chuck" on line today, while I sewed the back-up blouse for Addie.

and the Number 1 reason I'm glad to be unemployed:

I went to pick up my pay check from Murray Care today, and the door was only opened a crack before that old folk's home smell came rushing out to grab my nose and make it cry for mercy. But since I was only there for 3 minutes, I didn't come home smelling that way myself.

Sweet. (With respectful apologies to any who are unhappy to be unemployed, currently)

It's a plot.

Addie plays violin in the school district junior high symphony orchestra. They have a simple uniform: white top, black bottom, look nice. Until recently, she has been content to wear a short sleeved white t-shirt (which she thought was a little low-cut) over a long sleeved white t-shirt that had a pastel snowflake on the front.

Now she's discovered boys, and one of them sits across from her in the orchestra. She decided it was time to upgrade her top. We went to the fabric store, where she chose the pattern she wanted, and even paid for the fabric herself. Granted, it was on sale at 40% off, but it was still $16. (She wanted me to make the blouse because she is working on goals for home making, and wanted to cut out the material - in case you wonder why we don't just buy a blouse.)

This is the pattern she picked. It can be either a short, short dress, or a tunic. Notice the smooth, flat collar, and the absolute lack of gathers going from the sleeve to the collar.

This is the picture from the pattern instruction. Notice the arrows, pointing to where the collar bits should go. The flat edge should line up with the back, and the front edge should stick out, so that there is overlap for a purely decorative button.

Again, there are no gathers indicated, either in picture or print instructions.

This is the collar piece, with the pattern bits laid on top, to show that I cut them out to the proper size.

And here is the collar, pinned to the blouse.

Notice that the back doesn't line up, and the front doesn't stick out.

Remember, I can't gather all that extra fabric up: the collar join is smooth and flat.

I took this monstrosity, my pattern pieces, and directions to the fabric store where all this had been purchased. There, I was assured that if I simply notched the inner curve of that collar, all would be well. "Each notch will add 1/4 of an inch. You'll be amazed how well it will work."

And I would have been. But it didn't. First of all, no amount of notches will put 7 inches into what is 12 inches of fabric. There is no space-time continuum solution to this problem. So now I'm desperate. I've purchased new fabric and a different pattern. I'll take this crime against innocent homemakers to my genius mother, and see if she can create a pattern piece that will fit the neck of the blouse as it is actually cut to be.

I think that this kind of deceptive direction, along with the price of fabric and patterns, and the determined kink in my back, is all intended to keep me shopping at Wal-Mart, instead of doing it myself.

In case I don't see ya. . .

Today was my last day at the Murray Care Center. For that alone, it was a great day. However, I have learned once again to be careful what I say out loud.

I said to another aid at breakfast, "I don't care if my whole hall has diarrhea, it'll be a good day because it's the last day." Well, no one had diarhhea, but one woman made things interesting.

She's a dementia patient, and she has her distinct issues. She is the reason that they had to remove the candy vending machine from the employee section. (She had taken something from her brief, and deposited it in the drop, and that's as specific as I care to get.) On upside there, it may have cured my addiction to vending machine candy. I can't look a vending machine in the face now.

Same patient, with adjusted medication, three weeks later. She's in a wheel chair with a lap belt because she wanders. This is supposed to be a restraint. She's not tied to a bed, you understand. She's just not supposed to be able to stand up. So how does this woman manage to reach into her brief, grab a handful of . . . stuff. . . and fling it on the carpet?

I cleaned up the environment, and then took her to the restroom to finish cleaning her up. The whole time I'm wiping her down, she's cursing at me, and asking me what the I'm doing. So the third time I tell her "I'm cleaning off the poop!" she says, "I know that! You must be stupid." It's funny how being called an idiot looses its sting when the person calling you names functions at the level of a chimpanzee.

This woman's name? Jane. Not the barking Jane, a completely different Jane. Is it the name?

So, I was all set to breeze out of there and shake the dust from my feet when I went to say goodbye to some of my favorite residents. I did okay until I got to Swede, an older gentleman (obviously). When ever I asked him if I could get him anything, he'd always say "Jim Beam and t-bone steak." The day I threatened to bring him a steak, he stopped asking for it. He gave me a hug and told me he loved me. I got all choked up, and made an undignified, sniffly exit. I guess it wasn't such a bad experience after all.

Good afternoon, good evening and good night.