This just in

I have a sinkhole in my blacktopped driveway!

Very bizzarre. It opened overnight.

That has been a slightly low spot in the drive for the past several years, and last night a hole "opened" for lack of a better word. It is about 6 inches x 8 inches across--but appears to be about 2 feet deep and way wider below the surface than the little 6 x 8 hole in the asphalt.

Of course, it is right in the middle of the garage back-out area.

I put an orange traffic cone beside it, and left Tom a phone message of "Watch out for the freaky sinkhole!!!" Hpefully he will not drive in after dark and have a wheel sink up to the axle. What a mess that would be! Because the hole is that deep and the edges of the asphalt look kind of crumbly.

Of course it has been raining most of the day, and all the water has been draining into the hole...

I think I'll go call Tom again and be sure he got my message!

I'd take a photo - but, well, it's raining too hard.

I Am Deeply, Deeply Disturbed and POed This Morning!

Those stoopid bus turds at CBS are going to put TAR on after 60 Minutes this fall. Which means after football ends, whenever that is, they will go right into 60 Minutes, and then TAR will follow at whatever the heck time it winds up getting. Thus it will be impossible to record TAR accurately on DISH. I hate that! Football always runs over by about 40 minutes. Always! Why don't they just build a 20 minute highlights or interview segment into their schedule and have the following shows (like TAR!) start at a set time!

But no. Now I will have to set my satellite to record a three hour time slot beginning when the show is actually supposed to start, and then hope I get the whole thing.

It drives me nuts. I gave up watching Cold Case because I could never tell when it was going to be on. It's so stupid.

I used to be a football fan but lately I'm not that interested. Most players are too indulged and self-oriented to be interesting people, and I am sick of the owners relentlessly trying to squeeze public money into their private-enterprise stadium building.

Stoopid, stoopid bus turds!

Go Fuze Yourself

I am going to fuze myself all day long. We are starting our 19th consequtive day of 90+ temperatures, most of them high 90s, like 98, 98. Yesterday was 99. Today we are supposed to hit 100+'. And freakin' humid. We might as well live in Houston! I plan to fuze myself all day long.

Okay. Blogger won't let me add a pic this morning, so the joke's on me. Fuze is a drink, one of those 5% fruit juice things. My favorite flavor is Dragonfruit Lime. It is so super delicious & cooling! The flavors I like all are 5 or 10 calories, without any artificial sweeteners added.

So. Right here - { } - picture my photo of a bottle of Fuze sitting on my computer desk. Stupid Blogger.

Where are you neat? Where are you not?

I am extremely neat & orderly in how I load things into the dishwasher. I can fit an amazing amount in with nothing so crowded or poorly positioned that it does not get clean. My daughter? (and the reason for this post) appears to throw things in from a distance of 10 feet. I can't stand it.

I am neat in how I put things on the kitchen shelves. I am not neat in what I put in kitchen drawers. My silverware is forced into organization by the divider thing. All other drawers are a jumble. Some are a themed jumble, but a jumble nonetheless.

I am neat in how I hang things in my closet. I am not neat with clothes in drawers, which are a jumble.

I am neat about where I put bills and paying them. I am not neat with all other mail which sits in a jumble for weeks sometimes until I get sick enough of it to open every freaking thing & decided if it is a save or toss item. Almost always it is a toss item but once in a while I find something important--so I have to physically open & look at every freakin' thing.

I am neat in the living room, where my books and art are. I am not neat in other rooms which accumulate carp at an amazing rate.

I am neat with my recycling corner. I am not with things on the kitchen countertop. (Daughter & her BF regard the recycling containers as a "pile it higher & deeper" discard pile. I hate that!)

I am neat with where stuff is in my purse. I am not neat with the stuff on my bedside nightstand.

I am neat with where stuff is in my car's console. I am not neat with stuff I keep on the floor in back (random umbrellas, hats, carry-alls, map books etc - no trash back there.)

So, where are you neat and where are you not?

Fooling Mother Nature

On Monday right at about 5 o'clock I had all the igredients for a lovely stir-fry cut up, in the pan and ready to quick cook. We love stir-fry and it's a great dish because it cooks in 5 or 6 minutes so I don't start cooking until Tom walks in the door.

Monday, Tom walks in at about 6:45 just ahead of some pouring rain. We get a little wind gust and *poof* no electric power! So I stick my lovely stir-fry in the frige and we eat cold sandwiches. (Power comes back in 3 hours, a typical summer power out around here.)

Tuesday, big clouds blow up again at about 5 o'clock - so I decide to quick cook the stir-fry, because Mother Nature can't fool me twice in a row lol. Big wind; power stays on. Tom gets home at 6:30 and we eat mushy, over-cooked stir-fry. Rain & more wind. The power stays on, but my satellite goes out! My satellite!

And it's still out! I MISS MY DISH!!! I have shows to watch, lol! I can get the local network channels but not the other 700 (or whatever) channels. DISH guy can't come out to the house until Friday.

How will I live?

What will I do?

I MISS MY DISH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Body Worlds

I really enjoyed the Body Worlds exhibit! It was interesting in a scientific and scientific-curiosity way. Here is the link for the show at the Science Museum of Minnesota:


The spectacular part of the exhibit is the display of preserved bodies. They are designed to present different body 'systems' - the muscle system, the nervous system, circulation, etc. by showing those parts of an actual preserved human body, fully articulated. I was not spooked by it at all. Of course I worked for years in a medical school so maybe I am a little more sanguine about stuff like that - I don't know. I thought it was fascinating.

It was also beautiful. There was a great artistry in posing the bodies in various (mostly athletic) postures. You really got a sense of what a complex yet fragile thing the human body is. All those improbable structures of bone, nerve and flesh somehow holding each other together and forming a functional body. Amazing!

It was also interesting to observe the people attending. Compared to most other exhibits I have been to people were very quiet & almost reverential in their intense fascination. It was a lovely display. They had a reservation system and let in so many people every 15 minutes. The exhibit took me about an hour and 15 minutes to go through.


This photo doesn't do justice to the finished work, but I thought it was interesting. The display was meant to show the muscles involved in locomotion - so von Hagen (the guy whose idea, techniques & efforts created the preserved bodies) posed a skeleton as though running and then pulled away the layers of muscle to clearly display them all. Instead of just spreading the muscles out in a flat and static-looking display he had them fan out as though they were flapping in the wind while the runner ran. IRL it looked beautiful. In this photo is just looks a bit strange.

One thing he did that I couldn't decide over was that he added eyeballs, lips and noses to most of the articulated displays. I guess it was an attempt to emphasize and preserve the humanity of the people whose bodies he had preserved. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it was distracting.

There were also a lot of non-articulated, preserved body parts on display--diseased and normal hearts, clogged and clean arteries, bone joints, etc.

I think it is well worth going to see.

This Weekend

On Saturday Tom, DS and I are going to visit the MIL's farm in WI. On the way we will stop for pizza (sigh--it's always pizza) in Menomonie. At least temps are not going to be in the high 90s! Still, my least favorite SIL is visiting so it will be a trip of highlights and low lights. The last time we were there she had a bunch of vacation photos organized into a Power Point presentation, lol.

Then on Sunday Tom and I are going into the Science Museum in St Paul to see BodyWorld. That should be really interesting. I have seen several mummies, but never more recently preserved bodies so it should be quite interesting. I'm quite excited to see it, actually.