I did not know her well, but no, I am not okay.

Captain

The noise on this photo is crazy bad, but I love it anyway and had to show it off. I’m just that proud of how it looks if you don’t look that closely or aren’t as critical as I am. I have edited it using Pixlr, but that site does something weird to photos when you re-save them. They come out … I don’t know … shiny, flat, smooth, over processed, I guess. The good news is that I got Photoshop and will load it onto my computer sometime tonight or tomorrow.

I should be able to use it well sometime by my mid-forties.

Every day I find it a little more frustrating that I have no subjects to take photos of to practice. I have the dog, but he’s only 10 inches tall when standing. And most of the time he doesn’t stand. He’s more of a laying down dog, which makes my primary subject about two inches tall.

And Josh as a subject…. no. Dude feels the need to ham and act weird. Just doesn’t work. I’m going to have to figure something out soon.

This year Jerry got to wear Archie’s hat from last year since Archie is still afraid of hats and things.

It’s important to note that Archie is a somewhat overweight corgi and Jerry is a somewhat scrawny yorkie.

Also, Jerry isn’t very bright.

However, he is probably one of the cutest things I have ever seen.

Also, I have to work tomorrow at 7:30, forty minutes from where I live. So I have to be up soonish. Which means I need to be asleep now.

Real writing and thinking soon, I promise.

I blame the kids I work with now. I had to talk for two hours straight, with brief, seconds-long pauses for them to respond in, and then babble some more so they would keep focused. Now my throat is sore again and my head, muscles, and joints are aching.

So not cool.

I promise I will have something interesting and worthwhile to say eventually, just not while I feel so crappy. For example, I’ve been planning to write about my experience with the outstanding Ronald McDonald House, but I haven’t even started writing that one yet. I’m afraid my writing ability won’t live up to what that place deserves. I’ll get over my chicken soon enough and come up with something.

I’ve also got something started about the supercool ICON theater we went to a few weeks ago, but that’s on the back burner too now while I try to get better through the tried and true method of doing nothing.

And then there’s the new apartment. We freaking love it. Except last night, when some idiot next door tried to kill bedbugs by mixing a random assortment of chemicals, created a gas with unexpected reactions, and six apartments (only six! Aren’t we lucky?!) in our huge building had to be evacuated and then evaluated by two HAZMAT teams. We were back within the hour, but it was annoying, and since that apartment is still blocked off with yellow FIRE LINE tape, we’re on edge that some of that gas will seep into our place.

Did I mention we’re saving for a house? And that I got a real job so a real home is a real possibility?

But for today I think it’ s just work from home a little, sleep a lot, maybe read my book, watch some TV on the internet, and sleep some more.

Aching joints, low fever, headache, and sore throat.

It’s been going on for three days now, getting a little worse every day. Let’s hope I’m near the end of it now.

If you raised your hand, or even if you don’t and you know something about web design, marketing, or Internet copywriting, please check out the web site I built in a desperate attempt not to work at WalMart.

So far it’s worked out, kinda. I’ve gotten one tutoring hit, one housecleaning/organizing hit, and one proofreading hit. I’ve plastered it all over Craigslist and that seems to be working fairly well, but I’m not sure it’s good enough. The tutoring portion of my site is also in my profile at UniversityTutor, though that has gotten me nowhere.

This is where I could use some feedback. What is good about the site that I should highlight or extend to other areas of the site? What needs improvement?

I really appreciate any input! Thank you!

New Flowers After Fire

I’m starting my first “real” day of work in Minnesota this afternoon so I don’t have time to write a real post or essay of any sort, so today you get a picture I took with my phone a day or so after our fire. My sister’s dogs and our family’s ancient cat are buried back here and most of their flowers were melted in the extreme heat of the fire. Sometime after the fire trucks stopped coming she replaced the flowers. The contrast of the beautiful, bright new flowers against dark ash and destruction is startling.

My only regret is that I didn’t bring my “good” camera. I love the composition of this photo and most of the way the colors turned out, but I would prefer it in a much higher quality.