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May 31 -- Mom came over tonight and we lounged around and talked and played Palm games and kept Dan company while he worked on his helicopter. I finished my current little stiching project, which will make a nice bookmark I think. Oh this morning I turned my torn linen pants into cute shorts, yay!

May 30 -- Henry and I went to the 8pm performance of the Fern Street Circus tonight! It was amazing. We've always gone in the afternoon before, but we agree that we will go at night from now on. The lighting effects made it extra magical, plus we didn't get hot and sunburned :) Gosh all the performers were great. Henry's favorite was the stiltwalker- spaceman. He's already dreaming up a similar costume. :) He shook the spaceman's hand after the show, which was a huge thrill! One of my favorite acts was the acrobat-guy who got stuck in his own ladder while trying to impress the girl from the audience. I don't know when I've laughed so much! The "Rings of Saturn" hula-hoop girl was fantastic, the spanish web girl was lovely, the tumblers, acrobats, and jugglers were exciting! What an amazing show. We sat on the grass right up next to the ring, so the performers were, at times, just inches away from us. Thrilling :)

May 29 -- I delivered my afghan to the fairgrounds today! It was neat walking around the place with all the workers setting things up for the fair. Well, my afghan was just as pretty as anything else that I saw being dropped off... so wish me luck! They gave me a free ticket for the fair and a magnet reminding me what day to pick it up again, too. I can hardly wait to go see it displayed with all the other lovely things in the home arts show!

May 28 -- I'm making some soup right now -- barley, garlic, potato, tomato, zuchinni, and a few noodles. Yum! I love a good hearty soup. It smells really good. I can hardly wait 'til it's done! A few days ago I foudn (gasp) a couple of fun Palm games that I'd never tried before. They're all astraware games. Bookworm is fun and rather relaxing, since it's not timed. I like the non-traditional stacking of the letters. Text Twist is much more challenging, and also very fun. I can usually find the 6-letter word, but I have yet to find _all_ the smaller words. Bounce Out is pretty good too -- it's a Bejeweled-type game, but not quite as pretty. It's entertaining enough for me to have played it every night since I got it :)

May 27 -- Mom took me to the Good Feet store today and she bought me a whole set of their nifty arch-support things. The saleslady was really nice and took lots of time to fit my feet just right. I think they will be really good! I wore them all day (switching from pair to pair as directed) and my feet don't ache or feel tired. My feet don't always ache at night but they usually do so I think it's a good sign. I read another Junie B. Jones book to Henry tonight. I'm really enjoying that series! I think there's only one more in the house that we haven't read yet, so it's time for another trip to the library. Arghhhhh I was in linux all weekend but jkust now I had to reboot into windows so I could use Quicken and it's sooooo aggravating. Soon I am going to make Quicken work in linux (Dan says wine or vmware will do it) and then I will stay in THE LUNIX!

May 26 -- Happy birthday Dad!

May 25 -- Henry's been having a little bit of trouble falling asleep lately; I think it's the same overactive brain problem that Dan and I have. So I've been trying to think of calming things that he can do to pass the time and distract himself from thoughts of "why am I not asleep yet?" etc. Today I got out my first palm, my IIIxe, and put fresh batteries in it and loaded it up with Henry-games, and then at bedtime I told him he could play with it as a special bedtime toy. I think it worked! Palm games are usually not terribly exciting or stimulating, so they're a good way to relax before sleep. As soon as he's a proficient reader he can read himself to sleep, too.

May 24 -- We went out to the field today and I listened to my wonderful audiobook and drew knots. Very pleasant and I finished my book! The reader, David Suchet, was amazingly good. He made Poirot seem likeable.

May 23 -- I finished my lace edging and washed and ironed it and sewed it to my pillowcase this morning. Very pretty -- I'll post a photo one of these days. Right now I'm keeping Dan company while he cleans up his worktable in the bedroom. I finished weaving the ends into my afghan so it's all done! Hmm, gotta post a photo of that, too. Man, I'm sleepy.

May 22 -- Just watched the season finale of Enterprise. It's the first one in a long time that didn't make me wish I was doing something else, so that's a good sign I guess. Maybe the next season will suck less than this one did :) We went to the Wild Animal Park with some homeschool friends and had a fine time, but it was HOT. And I got sunburned _through_ the long-sleeved shirt and giant hat that I wore all day. Grrrrrr. So does this mean I have to apply sunscreen under my clothes? How delightful. Oh yes, my face and neck got sunburned through sunscreen AND under my hat. Stupid sun. Mom gave me the cutest black rayon embroidered peasant top today! I adore it and washed it so I can wear it tomorrow. I wonder what it will look nice with... jeans shorts if it is hot again, or my black miniskirt, maybe. If it is cold, black leggings? Definitely jeans. After Enterprise when I gave Henry an extra goodnight kiss, and he gave me a Christmas ornament and a necklace that he made for me out of pipe-cleaners and beads! He's the best, dearest little boy in the entire world.

May 21 -- I've been reading the "Junie B. Jones" books to Henry (he chose a big stack of them at the library yesterday). He loves them, and I enjoy them too. They are written as if by a 6-yr-old, with some pretty ghastly grammer at times... I sort of edit some of that into proper English while I'm reading. Not all of it, just the parts that I really can't force myself to SAY.

May 20 -- Happy birthday Dampeoples ! And happy LATE birthday to Darren -- hope you had a good day, Dui!

Dan has been spending a lot of time at homestarrunner.com lately and of course he shows me the funniest stuff... the best part, I think, is the Strong Bad Email section. There's a new email every Monday. Some of them are really entertaining! A couple of the best ones are "techno" and "guitar".

Later... Kirsten came over tonight and we watched Star Trek Nemesis, which was very entertaining and chock full of Star Trekky goodness!

May 19 -- This evening Dan was working on his flying wing thing at his long worktable in the bedroom, so I sat in there with him to keep him company. I put on an audiobook and worked on weaving in the thousands of little yarn ends on my afghan and made good progress! The book is good, too -- it's Agatha Christie's "Evil Under The Sun" and it's read by a very good reader -- David Suchet, I think. He's fabulous and does all these different voices and reads it juuuuust right. I think Dan was enjoying it too. Maybe I can get him addicted to reading murder mysteries, the way I got him addicted to Tolkien and sci-fi :)

May 18 -- My mom gave me an Ionic Hairbrush and it's so nifty! I'm keeping it at my desk here and I brush my hair with it now and then... I can tell that it's making my hair all soft and glossy. What a cool gadget! Speaking of gadgets, we went to Circuit City yesterday so Dan could spend a gift certificate that he got for his birthday, and we had a great time looking at stuff there. I'm kind of drooling over the new Palm Zire 71 ... it's the first palm I've really been tempted by since my IIIc. It's small, light, really pretty-looking, fast as lightning, and has a beautiful bright crisp high-res color screen. My IIIc is still going strong but when it eventually dies, I think the Zire 71 would be a fine replacement :) It was also fun looking at the games for Gameboy and Gamecube... After we beat Zelda we'll probably rent some and see if any are worth buying. I know Henry'd be excited to play the Lord of the Rings games but we'll have to see how violent they are. I hear good things about Super Mario Sunshine and Animal Crossing, too. They had Metroid running on a new Gameboy and I played for a while (all stooped over -- the display was not meant for tall people) and it was quite fun. I'm nearly done with Warioland 4... I've beaten all 16 regular levels and one Boss, so there are just three more bosses left, I guess, and then whatever happens after you beat them all.

May 17 -- There was a helicopter fun-fly thingy out at the field today, the Hirobo Cup or some such name. While Dan was doing helicopter things and talking to helicopter people, I sat in my comfy chair and crocheted some lace (I'm making an edging for my silk pillowcase (by the way, those instructions have a typo -- ignore the "work 13 dc in next sl st" part)), played Warioland 4 (I beat two more levels and a boss!), and listened to an audiobook. Sounds dull, maybe, but really it was quite relaxing and pleasant. This evening we ate two heads of kale and I played Zelda for ages. I've got 8 3/4 hearts and I've doubled my magic meter!

May 16 -- Happy birthday wonderful Dan! I love you so much :) Last night Sally looked after Henry so we could go with Ken to see the 2nd Matrix movie... Going out all together was lots of fun, but the movie was only so-so. It had some cool parts and some long boring pointless parts but nothing really special. Oh well, that's about what I expected so I wasn't disappointed. :) We stayed up way too late last night and I am very tired but I only have two students later so I guess I'll survive. I need 12 hours of sleep again.

Later... Henry and I hung out with Ken after I was done teaching; we ate pizza and watched cartoons on Nick. And while I was teaching, Ken and Henry dug for treasure in the back yard :)

May 14 -- Ken came to visit! YAY! I did eight billion things today and now I am exhausted. Henry and I watched Mister Rogers togther and he visited George Roades , the sculptor who makes those amazing kinetic sculptures. There's one in our hideous Mall, and one in Port Authority. It was really cool seeing his workshop and craftsmen! Hmm, the website is down right now, but it worked earlier. Maybe it got Mister Rogers'd :)

May 13 -- When the fan blows on the windowshades in our room it makes a sound like typing. Last night it was worse than usual and woke me up about 6 times, arghhhhhhhhhhh. It sounded like there were TWO typists in the room, which it never did before. I've got to figure out a way to keep them from rattling so much. I think with a couple of cuphooks or thumbtacks and some elastic I could rig something up... Got a new color cartridge for Dad's new printer and now it prints in color, yay! I guess the one it came with was all dried up or something. I finally got a chance to play Zelda for a while today, and I got the third pearl and the 5000 rupee wallet and the special elixer AND I got "swordsman" status from Orca the sword guy.

May 12 -- Hey Melissa, watch the mail! ;-)

May 11 -- Slept late (9:30), went to the movies and had an all-around Good Movie Experience! We saw "X-Men 2", which was really quite good, much better than the first X-Men movie. The opening sequence was extremely cool (very good use of Mozart in a movie)! Plus the movie theater was neither too hot nor too cold, and the seats were the comfortable reclining kind, and we got there a little late so we missed all the stupid "trivia questions" and lame commercials, but were there in time for the previews. It's nice to see a movie and not feel ripped-off afterwards. Doesn't happen very often.

May 10 -- I'm feeling quite a bit better today :) We went out the the field for a few hours, and while Dan flew I listened to my audiobook (Under the Tuscan Sun) which is dull but pleasant, and crocheted a couple of doilies just for fun. I was using this extremely fine crochet cotton and a tiny little hook, and then tonight when I started working on my big afghan the hook felt as big as a garden hoe. Heh. Tonight we watched "Catch Me If You Can" which was pretty good... not great, but still better than your average Hollywood drivel. We finally had a night when Dan didn't have to work late and I wasn't feeling sick and horrid, so it was a real treat to spend some time together :)

May 09 -- Worked on my afghan a lot today, while I was teaching and then later on while I was watching "Manor House". I think I will actually have enough black yarn to finish it! I wasn't sure... but then I found another skein in the closet and now I'm fairly confident that I will be able to get it done soon! I'm so excited to have an entry in the Del Mar Fair. I've gone to the fair every year since we moved to San Diego, but have never entered a thing! Henry's going to display his collection of tiny vehicles in the Kids' Collections display, too :)

May 08 -- Ok I got about 9.5 hours of sleep last night so I do feel a bit better :) I'll just catch up a little bit here. Yesterday I realized that I'd better check the deadline for Fair entries if I want to enter my afghan -- turns out the deadline is May 9! *whew* just made it. So I printed out the form and got it all ready to mail today. Now I just have to finish my afghan! I still have to go around the edge with circles, and then single crochet (I think) and then weave in all the thousands of ends. I have to deliver it to the fairgrounds on May 28th, I think, so I'll have time if I hustle along a little bit :)

Later... mmm a nice evening. Henry's in bed, I just played Zelda for a while, Dan has been keeping me company and giving me excellent Zelda Advice, and now I'm going to have some soup, watch a little Seinfeld with him, and go to bed in our nice cozy comfortable bed. Ahhhhhhhhhh.

May 07 -- Ugh. Still sick. Long day. Going to bed.

May 06 -- Hmm, what did I do today... helped Henry play Zelda, watched Dan play Zelda, played a little Zelda myself. :) I need to take in my new pants a little bit.. which means I'll have to pick out the zipper etc. I think the fabric stretched out a little. Bah. Oh, well, it won't be too much of a pain. And I'm also going to patch my worn-out favorite linen pants and make them into shorts. I was thinking of embroidering some flowers around the hem or something, just for fun :)

May 05 -- Finished "Julie and Romeo" today. Lovely book! I hope Jeanne Ray will write lots more. Between Dan, Henry, and me, there was hardly an hour today when *someone* wasn't playing Zelda :) What a game!

May 04 -- Still have a little cough, but I feel better. I cleaned up a monstrous pile of junk from the place where a table used to be before it got moved yesterday, read my book ("Julie and Romeo"), and played some more Zelda. I got past the Forbidden Fortress and on to the island where I have to buy a sail, and then I saved so Dan could have a turn, and drove down to SD to get The Atomic Monkey. He is extremely excited about Zelda, and started playing before bed. Before that, while he was watching Dan play, he ran to his room for a few minutes and came out in a Zelda costume! (Well, a Link costume really). Oh, my hardback copy of "Betsy, Tacy, and Tib" got here today! It's a library discard, so it was only $2 or so, and although it is a bit worn it is far superior in every way than the cheap, disgusting, tacky paperback they had a Bookstar. Yay for quality hardbacks! I hope I can find the rest of the series in similar editions.

May 03 -- I'm a little bit sick... a little cough and a little sniffle and I feel a bit run-down, so I had a nice lazy day doing nothing and watching Dan move furniture around to make more room for tinkering with helicopters. He brought me English muffins and juice, and tonight he ran out to the store before they closed to get me a hot water bottle for my chest. And this afternoon he went out for a while and came back with a gamecube and the new Zelda game (Wind Waker) for me, just as a surprise treat! So of course I played for quite a while, heheh. It's a little hard to get used to the 3-D, since I'm used to nice flat "Link to the Past" Zelda but I'm finally getting the hang of it I think. It's a very fun game, so far! When Henry gets home tomorrow he's going to be rather excited, too :)

May 02 -- Last night Dan showed me the most amazing, creative car advertisement I have ever seen. You must see it. Now, keep in mind that it's REAL, not computer animation, not spliced-together camera trickery. It took 606 takes to get everything to work perfectly. You'll need flash6 to view the ad here: http://home.attbi.com/~bernhard36/honda-ad.html. After you've watched it go read the news article at The Daily Telegraph and be amazed! This morning I showed it to Henry and he loved it too -- watched it over and over and we talked about all the little parts and stuff. Wow :) Heh, the first time I saw it, I said to Dan, "This can't have been made in the USA. Has to be from Europe or England." Bingo. Today Henry and I found a nifty little mini-cache near the pier, and then we took a walk down the pier and found that a large pelican was sitting on the railing near a fisherman, hoping for handouts. We watched him for a quite a while. The friendly fisherman said they call him Charlie, and he hangs around the pier a lot. A couple of tourists got a little too close, trying to get a picture, and Charlie clacked his rather fearsome beak at them. We stayed a respectful distance away. Dan and I rented the first X-Men movie tonight and we're going to watch it now :)

May 01 -- Henry and I went to see the Red Company this morning, way out in Valley Center. It was great! We had such a nice time together. Well, it's eight o'clock and I've already tucked Henry into bed and now it's bedtime for us, too... we're both so tired, been woken up by the phone at the crack of dawn every day this week. And so goodnight unto you all.

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2004

jan