Amy came over this afternoon and had Ed rip a bunch of CDs for her to load on her new MP3 player. It was fun. I got to listen to a bunch of her music. Boy, I thought I had eclectic tastes but I've got nothing on her! In her 2 hours of music on her MP3 player, she's got some a cappella Scottish milking music, Sarah Brightman and Andrea Bocelli, Sing Sing Sing from Swing Kids, Neil Diamond, Guns 'n Roses, Partridge Family, Bullet Boys, Duran Duran, and Godsmack, just to mention a few. Criminy!

When asked on Dateline if he had a girlfriend, Apolo Anton Ohno said he was seeing "people." He didn't specify male or female. Wonder if that was another Ricky Martin ploy?

Joey had a friend over to play--Mia. She is such a cute little thing. Very small, though. She made Joey look like a giant, though. Joey and Mia have just started playing together which I am happy about. She is my favorite of Joey's classmates. She is Mexican and Joey likes that, being half-Mexican herself. And while Joey is quite tan compared to me, she looked downright pale next to Mia. But they are so cute and so sweet together. I'm glad her mother was so willing to let her come over on short notice. That bodes well for future play dates.

One of my neighbors has Hepatitis C and is undergoing chemotherapy for it. She gets a chemo shot every Friday and has been for about 3 weeks or so but after this last one, she starting having terrible reactions to it. She's really out of it--hallucinating and being sick. Her husband works Tues-Sat and her two teenage daughters are in school during the day so the church is arranging for women to sit with her in 2 hour shifts during the day and arranging for people to bring dinners to the family. She still has another 5 months to go on this chemo so it's going to be a long-term thing. I will be bringing them dinner on Wednesday and will be sitting with her in the future. This week is all filled up but I offered to go on the next 3 Tuesdays. Poor Rose. I feel so bad for her. She thought she'd be able to keep this quiet. She was embarrassed for people to know she has Hep C because she thought they would think she got it from drugs or something. But we all know she's a nurse and assumed she got it through medical contact. But we all love her and feel so bad for her and her family.

One of my neckbolts seems to have pretty much gone away, I'm very happy to report. Now I feel significantly less Frankensteinish.

I started a second diary today. I realized that as much as I try to believe this journal is just for me, there are still a lot of things I don't feel comfortable writing for *anyone* else to read, even anonymous internet people. Dark, ugly stuff that I don't even like to admit to myself sometimes. So I opened a second diary, passworded it and wrote my first entry. I don't know how often I write in it, but it feels good to have it there as a very private little dumping ground. And with password protection, it's even more private than a paper diary.

Tomorrow is another full day for my project--I'll be doing more liquid emulsion--this time on fabric and more watercolor paper. And then on Wednesday, I'll be putting it on wood. We'll see how that works out. I hope it doesn't suck. If it does, I'll have to put my second photo on some other paper--perhaps watercolor paper or stretched canvas. I'm thinking I might like to put a white background on that wood--perhaps some white oil-based primer rubbed in well to look like it was just pickled. I'll see how it works best.

Looks like the rain is returning. Wah! I've loved the sun. I even saw a prediction of snow mixed with rain on Thursday. Wah! I want the sun again. Sun sun sun! More sun!

This week is starting to look busy--I start the neighbor dinner swap thing on Tuesday, make dinner for my chemo neighbor on Wednesday (along with Brownies meeting) and make dinner for bookgroup on Thursday. Man, I'm cooking too much this week! And Saturday is Medieval night. That settles that--no cooking on Mon or Fri. No way no how. Can't make me. Nope.

And now is the time in Lobotomyland when we heed the call of nature as my large beverage from dinner sits heavily in my bladder.

Ta!

--L