Cute outdoor light strings!

Um, yes.

Jessica, if there is a Y near you, they sell them also. Possibly other gyms as well.

Heh - this is so we can go to the Y! Family swim is on Sundays when the gift shop is closed, so I'm looking for somewhere closer to home today.

Kat, I feel you on the all-or-nothing thing...we got no help from the government when I was growing up and we could have used it. Now, of course, they're kind of up my butt, though. Which I'm not loving.

Oh, -t, I'm so sorry.

Much luck to you Kat in dealing with all this.

I just had my brother crash with me for a couple of days on his way to Singapore, and when he left this morning he left behind a t-shirt, a bunch of dried pears he'd bought to eat on the plane, and one of his Blackberries. Oy. Happily he has his work Blackberry with him and he won't need this one for the short time he's in Singapore, so I will have to overnight it to his house. What a pain, though. (Also, I don't like dried pears.)

This woman wins:

A Minnesota mother has given birth to a baby boy while driving herself to the hospital, with the newborn's father steering the car from the passenger's seat. The Pioneer of Bemidji said 29-year-old Amanda McBride was rushing to the hospital Wednesday when suddenly her water broke and the baby "just slid out."

McBride said she was feeling labor pains at work, so she drove to pick up the baby's father and headed for the hospital. The father, 33-year-old Joseph Phillips, did not drive because he has a history of seizures.

Phillips told the newspaper that McBride yelled at him to take the wheel as she cradled the 8 pound baby boy, Joseph Dominick Phillips.

She didn't just give birth in a car, she gave birth while driving the car. That is more badass than I can ever hope to be.

Whoa, that IS badass. Or baduterus, actually.

Oh my god, Jessica. I don't even want to be that badass, I think.

Kat, I'm so sorry for all the disability nightmares. It makes absolutely no sense.

And -t, I'm so, so sorry for your loss. We're all thinking about you.

Kat, I forgot to say that I hate the all-or-nothingness of the system. It just doesn't make sense.

Lawd, FNL is trying to kill me. Just watched this week's episode. I might have to buy that cover of "Teardrop" that they used at the end. Oh, Matty. Oh, Riggins. Oh, Vince and Tami and Jess and everyone.

Yes, that song was excellent.

I know! It was an excellent episode. Also, I can't believe that the real reason that Matt stayed in Dillon was to be near Julie. Bad, bad decision making.

I'm so sorry, Kat--and, yeah, as support staff in a medical facility, I've seen similar stories over and over and over for years. It would be merely infuriating if it didn't fuck so deeply with people's lives.

Ugh. Long, long day with Matilda already, ending with her in disgrace and on lockdown, with no TV and no princess movies or Harry Potter for the rest of the weekend. I'm now even more in awe of msbelle, and so glad you're about to move someplace where you've got a good built-in support system. Even when it's comparatively minor and you understand absolutely where it's coming from and you don't lose control of the situation, the willfulness and defiance is draining to deal with.