J if for Jeopardy

I love game shows but Jeopardy is by far favorite, nothing but questions. No doors to choose, no celebrities to crack stupid jokes, no prizes to buy, just questions and answers. I am most grateful when I get to watch Jeopardy because it is on at 7:30 and if I'm watching it that means I got out of the office early.

The World is at Your Fingertips

Remember when faxes became available and you could send someone a letter and they would have it in the time it took to make a phone call, it was amazing. Now they thought of having to walk all the way to the fax machine, when I could just email something. The Internet has put the world at our fingertips. And even better it has put my family at my fingertips. I am very grateful to have access to the words and pictures of those I love whenever I need them.

Humor is in the Eye of the Beholder

I have been blessed to grow up in a family with a keen sense of humor. Whenever I start a new job there is always a tiny fear that they might not "get" my sense of humor. So far I have been fortunate. Although every cloud has not had a silver lining the love and support in my family with humor mixed in has seen us through so much. I am truly grateful to have been gifted with my sense of humor, and nothing is more satisfying then when others "get" it.

This Blog Has the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval

I read many, many magazines and within all of them I have my favorite sections. But every month when I get my Good Housekeeping it brightens my day. The heavier magazine feels good in my hands and I know that there will be plenty inside to entertain me. Since my job has taken on a lot of additional resposiblity (read work) I don't have as much time to read as I used to and a couple of my magazines get more skimming than reading (Sports Illustrated, Time) but I am always grateful to have a new Good Housekeeping there when I need something light and entertaining.

Let Freedom Ring

I know after the election and all, everyone is all, "oh this country is so great". And feeling all emotional over our new president-elect. And so am I, but that's not what I mean.

I am speaking more of the personal freedom I have to make my own choices based on what I want. Too most people this is a no-brainer, but it wasn't for me. But I did learn, and I now have choices where before I didn't believe I did. I am no longer a victim to what happens to me, but responsible for what I do. The extreme gratitude I have for this freedom is unexplainable to those who haven't been where I've been, but take it from me it's huge.

As for erasers, yes I was speaking of math because in my job I get a 100 page EOB (explanation of benefits) with individual lines of payment for several clients over several invoice periods with a single total on the bottom. I can't export the information into Excel so I have to total by individual, and then by period and hopefully get the single total on the bottom. The calculator is only as precise as the data put in, and I do make mistakes, and I do use real erasers as I write in subtotals as I get them. I was also using it as an analogy (which was going to be my A because I love analogies) to my life. When I screw up, I can go stop, apologize, do what I can to fix it and move on.

To Err is Human

My E is for erasers. I make mistakes, a lot of them. But I do not have to get stuck in them because I have erasers. I can start over and try again. I have often been told "You think you're always right", and the truth is that by the time I open my mouth I do. But first I have added up the numbers and then started at the bottom to make sure they tied, and then subtracted what I started with and balanced with what I was expecting. And then erased it all and started over if it didn't.

I came up with my E at work today, while nothing was balancing and I had to keep starting over. I was grateful that I have erasers, and am willing to use them. I just got home and am downloading files to work on from home, checking the other blogs while I did that I smiled at Erika's. Tonight I have a 4000 line Excel spreadsheet that with the help of filters and formulas I need to reduce to a one line summary for upper management. But me and Excel go way back, great pick Erika.

Lions, and Tigers, and Wings Oh My

Day 4 of my gratitude diary and D is for Detroit sports teams. I enjoy watching sports, I enjoy it even more with a team I care about. And I do care about my home teams, win or lose, good or awful, you don't root against the home team in my house. I've always enjoyed football, and the blue streak in hockey helped my follow the game so now that it is gone I can still enjoy the game, the talk radio station I listen to started carrying the tiger games and I found I really enjoyed listening to them on the radio soon I was seeking them out on TV also (it may have helped that the Tigers had a couple of winning seasons), I still don't really get into basketball but I can watch a game here or there during the season and if (like there is an if in the Piston's game plan) Detroit makes it to the playoffs I watch most of the games. It's not about winning, since of all my teams the Lions are my favorite (0-8 so far this season), but about the spirit of the game. I am grateful to live in an area that has such a wide variety of sports teams to cheer on.

C is for Christmas Decorations

No that's not last year's tree. That's this year's. It would be up sooner but Gordon draws the line at Halloween weekend. Since he's the one that does the majority of the work I concede. There are trees, and lights around the ceiling, and villages, and touches in every room. This year with two houses to decorate it's twice the fun.

I'm grateful for a husband who understands how much I love these decorations. I'm grateful for the bargains I pick up every year after Christmas that add to our collections. And I'm grateful for the feeling of serenity I get when surrounded by Christmas.

B is for Bargains

I'm not a big shopper. Somehow I missed that in the "female" gene. But when I do shop I love the clearance aisles, the outlet stores, the super sales, yard sales. Yes you could find me spending Thanksgiving night at Wal-Mart to get the super priced MP3 player as a Christmas gift. I guess the other B that goes with this is brains, I know that just because it is called a sale doesn't mean it is a good price. But when I find that one thing I've been wanting marked down to less than half of what I expected to pay for it, oh yeah I'm grateful.

Your Challenge Should You Choose To Accept It

Adrienne is doing NaBloPoMo, which I'm sure you have all seen on her site. I have a bit different take on it.

I've had a pretty yucky year, nothing totally traumatic, just feeling blah. And in this time I lost touch with what kept me sane. My twelve step program. Well, I am going to start trying to make my way back and the first thing my program gave me was gratitude. The ability to see good things even when there doesn't seem to be any good. Gratitude needs nurturing and I intend to do that in the days leading up to Thanksgiving. Now Thanksgiving is the one day set aside to remember that there is a lot in life to be grateful for, and if you go around the dinner table asking each person what they are grateful for you get a lot of, "my health", "my family" "my job", but I'm talking the little stuff. The stuff that gets taken for granted.

So here it is, 26 days until Thanksgiving and 26 letters of the alphabet. The challenge follow along in your own blog, or just leave a comment in this one, you may just remind someone else of something in their life that needs a little gratitude.

A is for Air Conditioning. I hate being hot. I can't sleep without covers. I have a hard time breathing warm air. I love the ability to control the temperature. I am grateful I am at a point in my life that it is all about me being comfortable.

All My Children

Bryan turned 10 last week. I think I am on a soap opera where a baby is born, they go to a commercial and he is a toddler, a couple of more commercial breaks and you have a teenager.

Are we going to let the terrorists win?

Okay, keep in mind that it is 2:30 in the morning here and I can't sleep, I really need to though. So here is what is running through my mind. The republican vice-presidential candidate has the nerve to say that the democratic presidential candidate pals around with terrorists when she herself is a terrorist.

See this pro america comment really bugs the hell out of me. That and the "real" america, but as that was not actually said by her I'll stick with the pro america. How dare she decide what pro america is? How dare she decide that only her beliefs are true american beliefs, that any one who wants otherwise is anti-american? Guess what america is black, white, red, brown, yellow, rich, poor, middle-class, hetrosexual, metrosexual, homosexual, anti-sexual, christian, muslim, jewish, buddhist, conservative, green, liberal, independant, tree-hugging, gas guzzling, pro-choice, pro-life, home schooled, college educated, ignorant, blue collar, white collar, big kids, skinny kids, kids who climb on rock, tall kids, short kids, even kids with chicken pox....

The america I want to be around for my grandchildren has room for everyone and allows the freedom to believe what you choose. The terrorists hate that about us, apparently so does Ms. Palin.

At least it hasn't been a year

I'm back, I won't claim to be here often, but I didn't want it to go a whole year.

So here's why I don't want to live in a conservative world. This is not a true story, although it could be.

14 year old girl, mom died because they couldn't afford health care, dad doesn't know how to talk about "girl" things. Without sex education in school, of course she believed Johnny when he said she couldn't get pregnant.

With no other option but carrying the pregnancy to term, she has a baby boy. Not a zygote, not an embryo, not a fetus, but a baby. A baby she didn't want but can't give up either. The government that insisted he be brought into life will now abandon him.

Junior lives off what little his mom can earn working two jobs. Without an education she has little to offer, even her time. Junior starts getting into trouble at a young age. School's in his neighborhood can't afford any after school activities, they barely manage books. Looking for someone's attention, anyone's, he soon has the attention of a local gang. For his eighteenth birthday he holds up a liquor store, things don't go as planned and a cop is killed.

Now Junior is on death row, the government fighting to take the life they insisted be brought to term.

Now I know there are a lot of holes in this scenario, and I don't claim to understand even half of what is involved with providing a government that works for the people, but it underscores why I am voiting for Obama. Not that I agree with everything by the way, I agree with the idea of the death penalty, I just don't think we have a judicial system that is capable of applying it fairly.

Everything I Know About Spines

Came in handy tonight as there was a question on Jeopardy that actually used the same spinal model they showed in the class today. It was very interesting learning about the spine and after seeing the intricacies involved it only reinforced my belief that although I know man evolved, there was some intelligent design guiding it.

Other than Jeopardy answers here's what else I learned:

Nothing to eat after midnight before the surgery.
Daily meds can be taken with small sips of water morning of surgery.
Bring all meds with you in their original containers. (Not pain meds)
Show up two hours prior to surgery
Go through the Main Entrance of the hospital to the admitting office next to the gift shop, do not stop at Starbucks.
From the admitting office take the elevator to the second floor.
Check in on the second floor.
Patient will then be taken to pre-op, family may be allowed to go with them.
Surgery will take 1-2 hours per level (ours is two levels)
Post Op will take 90 minutes to 2 hours depending on recovery time for patient and work load of nursing staff.
From Post Op patient will be taken to room probably on 5th floor, possibly on 7th floor.
Patient will be in hospital 2-4 days.
Follow up with surgeon in 4 weeks, driving will most likely be approved at that time.
Roller coasters may be approved after bone density testing.

Any questions?

Gotta love 'em

Megan went to the movies of Friday and I was dozing in the chair around 6:30 Sean came in:

S: My mom needs to borrow something.
G: What?
S: I don't remember.
G: Should we call your mom?
S: Nope.

Sean begins wandering around the kitchen. Then says, "that" pointing at the spice rack.

G: Salt?
S: No
G: Pepper?
S: No, the one with the red on it.
G: Lawry's
S: No, the one with red.

I meanwhile have been walking into the kitchen I pick up the Lawry's and say, "this?"

S: Yea, seasoning stuff.
G: What is your mom making.
S: Steak
G: OK then she probably needs this.

I fit the salt into his pocket and off he goes to ride his bike home. About 5 minutes later Robin calls, "I need butter for the potatoes, I have no idea where he got the idea I needed Lawry's"

Back comes Sean with the Lawry's and I send him off with a stick of butter.

About an hour later I went over to Robin's

G: How come I wasn't invited over for steak?
R: Steak? We had pork chops.

Later I was on the phone with Robin's uncle when her landline rang. We figured it was Megan calling for a ride home from the theater. Robin had Josh and Sean on her lap and asked Sean to answer it. It rang again while he looked at Robin, then again while he slid down her legs, then again while he turned up the volume on the TV, then again while he twirled across the room, then again while he tossed everything off the table looking for the phone ringing yet again on the counter. He picked it up and said, "they hung up." Reminded me of a living "Family Circle" comic.

Best Laid Plans

We left the Detroit area around 9:00 pm, the plan had been to leave around 7:00 but I had planned the plan very loosely with many plan B's, so I was still okay. Mapquest had us driving to Port Huron and crossing into Canada on the Blue Water Bridge, but we did that the last time and Megan wanted to go across the Ambassador. I can do that. The plan was to fill up on gas and get soda and ice just before crossing. I haven't crossed on the Ambassador in years and I was a little confused on where to turn. We missed the gas stations but I had 3/4's of a tank so I figured I was okay. We were in Canada when Gordon mentioned soda and ice. Damn, Canada has yucky diet soda. We stop at a gas station and for 3 sodas, a coffee, 4 candy bars (Aero), and a bag of ice it was $15.00 even. And yucky diet Pepsi at that. Oh well, I had ice now so I would have good, cold soda soon.

The plan included driving until I was tired and then stopping for the night at a hotel. But the plan included the proviso that if Melody was in labor I would not get tired. Gordon was in charge of that. Sure enough about 12:45 when I was thinking about another hour and we would stop, we got the call that Melody was going to the hospital with contractions 3-4 minutes apart. Book light and trivia cards came out and we were now on a mission. Adrenaline kicked in and I never did feel really tired. We decided to stop and put some gas in still in Canada just to make sure and do a potty stop. I put in $20.00 for less than 1/2 a tank and the restrooms were closed for the night. Once we crossed back into the US (around 2:45) we checked in on Mel and the contractions were still 3-4 minutes apart they had given her pain medication but not the epidural yet. We had to make another stop for restrooms and I filled up the rest of the tank at $3.15 a gallon. (Cheap compared to the $3.50 it was in Michigan.) Once we got to Rome we could follow the blue hospital signs and made it to the hospital with no problem around 6:00.

Melody had just gotten the epidural. I was allowed into the room with Mary and Jonathan but Melody, Bryan, and Gordon had to go to the waiting room with John, and various friends of Melody and Jonathan. Melody was experiencing some side effects of the epidural one of which was shaking. It was very unnerving to watch her just tremble in the bed. The adrenaline was gone and around 7:00 I said "I think I'm going to pass out" had I been standing I would have been sure that I was going to pass out. After that I could hear everyone talking but I could not respond in any way. I was saying to myself that I couldn't do this, but I had no control at all. I heard the nurse call for the Rapid Response Team, they had just introduced such a team on ER so I new what it was and did not want them to respond. Eventually the smelling salts got to me and I came out of it. The Rapid Response Team was there and wanted to take me to emergency. I declared that I did not drive for 9 hours to sit in an emergency room while my baby had a baby. We agreed on a trip to the cafeteria where I got some cereal. While I was out they had brought Gordon in and sent him to the car for a soda for me. The car was on the other side of the hospital and Gordon is still walking a bit slow, so we made it back to the maternity ward about the same time. I insisted I was fine and went back in. Melody has stopped the trembling but was starting to itch. She was digging at her face like a mad man. She had no feeling from the waist down and her legs kept slipping off the bed and someone would have to lift them back up for her.

While I was down at the cafeteria her doctor had said that it would be soon, he was going home to change and get his kids off to school and when he got back she would be ready to go. We never saw him again. The midwife that had seen Melody last week while she was in was now on duty and she took over. She was incredible. Melody was at about 9 1/2 centimeters and her water had not broken yet. The midwife explained that since Mel was in no pain and was totally comfortable she preferred to let Mel's body do more of the work right now in pushing the baby down, that Mel could start pushing now but that it would be better to wait for the baby to get further along. So we waited, Mel napped. Around 9:15 they broke her water and we waited, Mel napped. Around 9:45 they were ready to start pushing. Mel pushed like a champ. The midwife coached like Sparky Anderson. As Melody was pushing the midwife was letting her know which pushes were doing the right stuff. "that's a good one, another one just like that" "nope a little lower push down some" Apparently the epidural does not numb everything so as the baby got lower Melody could feel the pressure, which felt a whole lot like pain to her. Soon we could see her head slipping out when Mel pushed but as soon as the push was done she would slip back. With each push a little more would come out but then go back as the push was done. It felt like she pushed forever and just as the head was staying out a little after the push Melody declared she was done and could not do this anymore. The midwife in true Sparky fashion "oh yes you can, and when you feel like you want to yell use that breath to push harder instead" Mel did and the head was out. There was this glorious head of dark hair. The midwife stopped Mel from pushing and did what she needed to do. When she was done Mel pushed again, the rest of the body came out and the baby turned around. We could now see the face but not much else. They put her (and we weren't positive it was a her) on Mel stomach and Mel yelped. The baby was not crying which scared us laymen a little, but they rubbed her back and she was off. Jon cut the cord and the gender was confirmed. Lynn Marie was here.

More later, probably. See Lynn's blog lynnmiz.blogspot.com for pictures.

Clean Melody

Melody finally showered last Saturday. I do believe a good time was had by all. It reminded me of a Beauregard party with lots of beer and food flowing all day and most of the night long. There was a bonfire, a barbeque, presents, cake, cards, Kareoke, and at the end just some freestyling guitars. Lots of people in and out I passed, although not aced the test on names. I intended a much longer blog on the shower, and on how Best Buy employees talked me out of a totally implulsive purchase of a computer this week. But it has taken me two days to get the pictures from the shower loaded on my computer. (Mel, whatever that exlorer thing was that loaded on the CD would not allow me to copy the pictures to my hard drive, I had to open each one in my photo program and then save it to my computer.) And then upload to Yahoo. I kept Yahoo even after everyone else went to Flicker since I knew how to use it. Unfortunately, progress is everywhere and Yahoo is not the same as it was. A few (four) pictures failed to load and I have no idea why but you won't miss them. There's lots of pictures, mostly of the gifts and two separates sets so there are duplicates. But if you want pictures can be found at http://new.photos.yahoo.com/album?c=gretchengerth&aid=576460762396927671&pid=&wtok=j.4mnNQsSu88zo4PZ8fWZw--&ts=1176073323&.src=ph#page1

Happy New Year

Yeah, Yeah, I know, I'm sorry, now deal with it.

If it's any consolation I've thought about blogging several times over the past few months.

The things I remember that I wanted to mention:

WARNING LABELS

We have become a society lacking in personal responsibility, and as such more and more warning labels have appeared to cover the rears of corporations serving us so as to save us from ourselves. The most disturbing of which I recently (recently is probably not the correct word since I am actually typing this months later) found when eating a Reese cup that had traveled for a while in my purse. Anyone who has had a Reese cup travel around in their purse knows that a decent portion of chocolate remains on the wrapper once the candy is open. The most efficient way to remove the chocolate is to lick the paper. When the paper is in such close proximity to ones eyes one is able to see "Candy is a treat and should be consumed in moderation." If only someone had told me that many years ago.

BOGUS GIFTS

Upon completing the creation of inane warning labels, corporations have moved on to creating inspired promotions to get us into their stores. Having spent a lot of money at Circuit City in one trip during my Christmas shopping (around the last time I blogged) Circuit City sent me a gift card. The front of the card simply says THANK YOU - worth 10% of your next purchase of $50 or more. The back however is more informative "Offer good for one use and applies to total qualifying purchase on a single receipt within the specified offer dates. Not valid on previous purchases. Offer excludes computers, music, movies, games, game hardware, Sharper Image, Infinity, Velodyne, Bose, Polk, Apple, Kicker, MTX Thunder, LG, plasma TV's, LCD TV's, KEF, Outlet, and Gift Card Purchases." I'm not sure what's left in the store to spend $50 on, but I think I remember seeing some Reese Cups by the checkout the last time I was there.

EVERYTHING I NEED TO KNOW I LEARNED

Mostly from fiction. My entire knowledge of the Civil War is gleaned from novels such as North and South by John Jakes. I think what I learned in school was how to learn and have continued to do so every day. I guess a lot of what I know I also got from games and game shows. I know that Neville Shute wrote On the Beach only because it is a question in the original Trivial Pursuit game (I think I remember that the question was actually "what novel was a follow up to Neville Shute's ?????") I can't recall the name of the original book in the question but I remember if the author was Neville Shute the answer was On the Beach. I have no idea what the book was about. Anyway the pondering on the way that I learn came into play twice in the past couple of weeks. (In actual time it was the past couple of weeks, we are nearing the end of what I remember about what I wanted to blog.) I just finished an amazing book, Exile by Richard North Patterson. Although, I have loved all of the previous books by this author I wasn't really looking forward to this one and was slightly disappointed when Mommy started the other book I had brought home from the library and Exile was the only thing left that I had not read. By page 3 I was hooked, and I realized that I had no idea of why the Palistinians and Isrealis were fighting. I'm not sure how that happened but I do not remember ever "learning" about the conflict, I just "knew" that Palistinian equaled terrorist and Isreali equaled sufferer. But reading this book I understand more, I have a clue, not a phone a friend clue more of an ask the audience clue, but a clue non the less. The other instance where this type of learning came into play was regarding the dumber than a fifth grader show. A question last week dealt with area, math is one subject I have retained since my school days and knew the answer immediately, when I was talking to Gordon (not known for his math skills) about that show he mentioned that he struggled messed up on the "half" portion of the question but knew the formula for area since it is repeated throughout the Pink Floyd movie The Wall.

That's all for now, it might not take a couple of months next time.

And Now...

Okay I know it's been a while. But get over it.

I'm sitting here loading I-tunes in order to load music on Megan's new I-Pod and I have some down time. An I-Pod those of you who know me may say, but I thought you were at Wal-Mart at 3am the day after Thanksgiving to buy the $88 5GB RCA MP3 player. Yes I was, and I do believe that is the last RCA product I will purchase. I tried an RCA Camera at Easter that I have never been able to work. The MP3 player was an even bigger disaster. It was really cool if all you wanted to do with it was walk around and look really cool, however if you actually wanted to listen to music, not so much. No matter what I tried, or which program I used I could not get any songs to load on to the player. Although I know very little about MP3 players I'm pretty good at figuring out computer programs. I found the manual on the installation CD which told me all I needed to do was drag and drop songs through explorer, however no one told explorer which placed a big X over the device when I tried to drop on it. Through Media Player whenever I tried to sync the songs prepared and then stopped. Yahoo Jukebox had my hopes up as it when through each song on the Kellie Pickler CD taking a couple of minutes on each one only to come up at the end and say "Problems occured loading the following tracks" and then listed each and every track. That was the final straw and we went back to Wal-Mart where they began with "we have a 15 day return policy on electronics" tried "we can only exchange for the exact same thing and that was a one time only thing" fortunately no hysterics were necessary for a manager to be contacted and a full refund was agreed upon. This worked in their favor as I spent twice as much on the way out with the I-Pod. Hopefully this will go smoother.

Oh No You Didn't

Kathy had once posted about a friend of hers that had written a book, the title may have been, Is It Just Me. It was something about how many unpleasant encounters this person had with other people in consumer situations. I thought about this a lot as I too seem to have more than my share of unpleasant encounters, is it just me? I may be a little too involved to determine the answer but I don't think so. For example:

I was at Meijer's the other day, for once there was not a long line for the cashier and I was actually impressed. There was one person in front of me and she had already paid and was walking away when I began putting my purchases on the counter. (Chips, Pretzels, Hamburger, and 1 of 5 Sodas.) The cashier's phone rang just as she began ringing up my stuff, in the time it took to ring this up I learned that the previous customer had just had a baby, was not breastfeeding, did not have a social security card and could not apply for social services because of this, and that her and her husband were in the store frequently often attempting to scam the store with price label switching among other things. When the cashier got to the soda I told her I had 5, she rang up 6. I told her I had 5 total and that she needed to take one off, she sighed heavily as if this was a burden but took off the extra soda, without counting how many had rung through. I then swiped my credit card and said "it's credit", I waited a while and the cashier said "You need to put in your PIN", I said again "It's Credit". Again the heavy sigh and she said, "You're going to have to start all over" to which I replied, "Maybe if you weren't so busy on the phone I wouldn't have to start all over again." The cashier then says into the phone, (are you sitting down?) "I'm going to have to call you back I have a very rude customer." Oh No You Didn't. At this point the rant began, "Rude customer!, I'm rude!.........I would like to speak with your manager." The manager came and I explained what had happened, the manager expressed her apologies and thanked me for letting them know. And although I know that going to a manager really did not change anything, it let me vent a little (not that I didn't call Gordon as soon as I got in the car, and repeat the story to mom when I got home, and then tell everyone at work the next day.) Anyway, try as I might I can't find any personal culpability in this.

In other news, at a very pleasant shopping experience at Bed, Bath and Beyond I came upon a Twinkie cookbook (although I was there for a clothes hamper I could spend a day in the kitchen department just looking.) The book was interesting until I got to the meat section, Pigs in a Twinkie: sausage, twinkies and syrup. OK, pancakes are sweet, people put whipped cream on belgian waffles. But when I turned the page to the turkey sandwich I had to slam the book closed.

Last but not least we had an incredible thunder snow last night. Thunder, big lightening, all while it was snowing. The effect was awesome to watch. The snow on the ground this morning, not so much, especially for those of us on crutches.