Laura, doing reasonably well, you know how it is, always something more that needs to be done. Ms. H is fine, we spent yesterday with friends and she give me a gift certificate for a bookstore yesterday so I pranced about for a bit...

Fred Pete, Cashmere, KristenT, Brenda M, thank you all for your birthday wishes. Considering my own low profile here, all wishes are welcome...

~ma for C.

I just watched a delayed race and, wow, the roller coaster. Now the year is over (okay, not for Nascar but that is pretty much just methadone for me, not my drug of choice) for way too long. sniff...

I also can't believe that I am feeling possibly tired again after I slept all damn day.

Poor Cass.

If your body says sleep, you should.

But, before you do, could you hop on IM?

hop

Generic unlabeled plasticine -ma for C, in all the quantities she needs, to be shaped and arranged and named as she and you need.

Also, billytea continues, as per usual, to be possibly the most emotionally mature man on the planet. It is an honor to know you, sir, except for the part where I'd have to lock up my daughter if I had one.

Bleah. Long, weary weekend, though neither so long nor so weary as Hec's -- I'm fairly sure he's at work again right now. One of my brothers came in for a brief visit yesterday, on a quick side jaunt from a business trip his boss in Portland, OR, sent him on. And now I'm all fretful on his behalf.

He and my SIL have been in counseling for a few months over the babies issue; they agreed when they married some eight years ago that they wanted them, and now they're in their mid-thirties and he is painfully overready for parenthood and she's been waffling, saying she's not quite ready yet, for the last two years. And she's a couple years older than he is, and insulin-dependent-with-a-pump-diabetic, so there are huge health issues associated with continuing to wait for Ready. He's referred to the babies issue as a mild bone of contention a couple of times in the past, but yesterday he said, very quietly, "Ultimately, it'd be a dealbreaker." And then kind of shrugged like it wasn't a big deal and it'd all work out, but his voice and his face didn't go with the jaunty little shrug at all. And now I'm feeling all horribly fretful and big-sister protective. Dammit, he was supposed to be all happily-ever-after and done with! The fretting part was supposed to be done!

• **Super-star ~ma for C.***

Get the mammograms!

I started having mammograms every year when I was 40, because they were part of my employer's required physical. I had no family history, although I did have the risk factors of weight, early periods and no children. I was diagnosed at 49 with advanced breast cancer. I have a less common form of breast cancer that doesn't really form a lump, so it could only be spotted with a mammogram. If it had been found earlier, I could have been treated with a lumpectomy and radiation. Instead, I had a mastectomy and six months of heavy-duty chemo, plus the radiation.

"cluuuuuuuuu!"

Awwww. There was a tiny girl today at Mt. Vernon (I'm still in D.C.) who was humming then saying "Pop! Weasel!" I said, "She's singing 'Pop Goes the Weasel,'" and her mother said, "Oh my god! She is! She's been listening to it."

Best of ~ma to C.

ma~~to C.

DH keeps trying to tell me it isn't time for bed yet. I think he is lying.

I had cake - Deb's cinnamon cake -Savron? ( two words in one sentence that I'm not sure how to spell. ) Plus we had meatball subs made from the leftover meatballs I had put together for the party. mmm...

A friend of DH's gave hime 4 grocery bags ( paper) full of books. I went thru them today. 1 bag of - we've all ready read that. 1 bag of - just too far out of our reading area. and 2 overflowing bags of spy thrillers, serial killers and a bit of scifi. Went to half price books for our 10 dollars - and I walked out with 3 more books ( 2 fantasy , 1 romance) . Right now I have the odd pile next to my bed ( 10-15 books) , 5 boxes, 2 bags, and the books that keep following me home from work. If only we had a blizzard.

Feh. I have to leave work now. They've sucked all the oxygen out and it's stifling, like sitting on the tarmac in an airplane for two hours.

run, david, run