The following story will probably have you laughing hysterically. If you have a weak bladder, or are prone to peeing your pants, I strongly urge you to go to the bathroom BEFORE reading any further.

The experts say it takes a couple of hours once you fall asleep to reach R.E.M. sleep, the place where you dream. I say, it's not true for everyone. It's especially not true for me. I am able to fall into a deep sleep very quickly, especially in the morning when I don't want to get out of bed and go to work. This morning was a perfect example of that.

My alarm is set to go off at 5:30AM. My snooze button on my alarm clock is set for 9 minute intervals. After 54 minutes (6 snooze cycles for those of you weak in math), it no longer goes off. So I know that by 6:24 I MUST get up, or my alarm will not go off again and I will be severely late for work. Last night I was up too late, reading emails, reading a book that's taking me longer to read than I had thought when I checked it out from the library, and generally just not going to bed at a decent time. That led me to REALLY not wanting to get out of bed this morning.

After hitting snooze six times, and looking at the clock at 6:24, knowing I needed to get up, I closed my eyes and went directly back to sleep. A sleep so deep I started dreaming. The experts also say your dreams only last a few seconds, even though in the dream it feels like a long time. I'm no expert, so I have no idea how long before I started dreaming, but I know that I was dreaming when I suddenly awoke at 7:02. (Last chance to empty your bladder.)

I was driving a car down a residential street, with a couple cars parked in the street on each side, leaving just enough room for one car at a time to drive down parts of the street. Ahead of me, a car turned onto the street and pulled over to let me by, so it could then proceed down the direction I had just come. The weather was clear, although I have no idea if it was sunny, just that it wasn't raining or snowing or dark out. I came to an intersection where I could turn either left or right. I started to turn left, as that was the direction I needed to go, when suddenly, there was 6 to 8 inches of snow on the street which had not been plowed, and cars had been driving through it leaving only tire tracks. Believe it or not, that wasn't even what startled me the most. Ahead of me, blocking the road that I needed to go down, was a chain-link fence with a closed gate. I stopped, which upon retrospect, surprises me that I didn't slide around, as suddenly as I would have stopped had I seen something like that in real life. I was going to turn around, and as I glanced in my rear view mirror, I noticed the road behind me (if I had turned right instead) was also blocked by a chain link fence and gate. I thought to myself that I should just turn around and find another way.

As I started to turn around, a pickup truck pulled up next to me, with a woman driving it. On top of the pickup truck was one of those camper cab things, most of you know what I'm talking about, lol. Anyway, somehow...in that camper part, in the front, the part that sits on top of the cab of the truck, was a man, with a window looking out. So he was directly above the woman driving the pickup. I never saw the woman's face, but the man looked over at me and motioned that they were going to bust through the gate. As they passed me by, and I considered their sanity, I glanced back down the road I had turned off of, and would you believe there was now a fence and gate across that road too. So unless this pickup truck did what he said they were going to do, I was now stuck in this one block section with no way out.

I watched as the pickup truck rammed the gate and busted it wide open. I followed them through, and as soon as I was through the gate, the snow was gone, it was a perfectly clear day again. At this point, the road split in three, straight ahead, to the left, or to the right. I needed to go straight, through the town (small town that it was), to get to my destination which apparently was a customer's of mine. Next I hear a CB radio, which magically appeared in my car, and I heard the man from the pickup say he was going to try to find out why they closed the gates. Not 30 seconds later, he says over the CB, "I found it, there's a beam in the road here. I'll stay here and make sure no one runs into it until it can be moved." A steel beam. I guess the fences and gates were supposed to be used if they ever needed to isolate any part of the town to protect the people and prevent injuries, etc. I continued my drive down the main road through town.

Next thing I know, I'm not in my car anymore, I'm on a bicycle. And I'm not going through this town, I'm riding the bike through a shopping mall. I turn into a jewelry store, circle it, come right back out and stop, confused. I think to myself, because somehow I know I've biked through this mall before, that there must be a way out, but I'm at a dead end.

Then I woke up, saw it was 7:02, and got my butt in gear to get to work, albeit a little later than usual, lol.

Raise your hand if you peed your pants laughing while reading that.

Well, I'm definitely feeling better. My nose is clearing up, I'm not coughing that much, and I think I only sneezed twice today, lol.

I did some online shopping today. I am usually really behind on buying things that need to be sent out by mail, so I figured if I didn't get anything bought today, I'd never have it in time. I got a couple things for Kerry. There is one more really nice thing I want to get for her, but I wouldn't have it in time for Christmas. So maybe I'll hold off and get it for her for another special occasion. I got a t-shirt for my half sister (the one with the house in Hawaii), that says "I'm on Island time." I got a left-handers desk calendar for my aunt, because...well...she's left-handed! I also got her a large print crossword puzzle book, she loves crossword puzzles, and as she's gotten older (30 years older than me), she's found the large print are easier to read. Who knew! I wanted to get something for my friend Deb, but when I went to order it, they didn't have it in stock. Bummer! Now I have to look for something else! I also wanted to buy the sweatshirt I promised for FD, cause she sent me some music, but I didn't know what size she wants, so I'm waiting on an email back from her. Speaking of, for the hell of it, I just checked my email, and she replied. So now I can order that before going to bed.

What I'm thinking I might do, is take the presents for my aunt and sister with me to California and they'll have a sort of belated Christmas. I'll just tell my aunt to keep out a roll of Christmas paper, because it's always suggested that if you're taking presents on a plane with you, don't wrap them, because security may want them unwrapped? Better to be safe than sorry, right?

No cd's to buy this week, thank goodness! I needed to save my money up for Christmas shopping! LOL

Edit at 9:33pm...I tried going to the website, but apparently it's down right now. So I'll try again tomorrow night. Sigh...

Here are the pictures I promised way back here. These are the first few pictures I snapped with my film camera, the earlier ones are from my digital camera once my film was used up.

I didn't go to work today. I really expected I would, but when my alarm went off at 5:30, and I hit snooze for an hour, then slept for another hour, I knew I'd never have the energy to go to work today. I called my boss' voice mail, got a message that he wouldn't be in today, so I called a co-worker's phone and left a message for her that I wouldn't be in. I called her in the afternoon, wanting to check and see if something was taken care of on Wednesday when I was out. Turns out it was, so nothing needed to be done today. I'm feeling much better; not sneezing constantly, and my nose isn't running. It's still stuffy, but I can breathe somewhat normally through it. I'm just glad to get this out of the way now so I'm not sick over the holidays or my trip to CA over New Years.

Yay! I got pictures into blogger!!! Here are pictures from the full moon a month ago. I tried using a slower shutter speed, but with nothing to set the camera on, my hands wiggled and they came out blurry. Maybe it adds a little something to them, instead of being just plain boring moon pics, lol.

Ok, my post below really sucks, but I was fighting with the html code and it wouldn't do what I wanted it to do. I finally got it to at least separate my paragraphs, but the sentences are still too smushed together. Read at your own risk!

I GIVE UP!!!

For months, blogger has been having photo upload problems. Who knew!!! I have found out how bad it is in the last couple weeks. Most times, when trying to upload a photo to blogger, I get an error message, or tonight, there's just no picture; A white square and a red X. This has been going on for MONTHS, and they are still "working on a long term fix."

Well, since this doesn't seem to work with any regularity, and any photos that do get posted should be considered miracles, you won't be seeing any photos on my blog. I have tried about 6 times tonight to load photos, with no results. Therefore, I am back to boring text-only blogs until someone can tell me that blogger has really fixed this problem.

Since Thanksgiving is this week, in the United States, I am taking the day off tomorrow to get some Christmas shopping done. It's been a tradition for many years. I used to do almost all my shopping on that day, the day before Thanksgiving. But a few years ago, it was pared down to just "sock presents" and anything else I might come across.

For those that don't know, I celebrate Christmas with my "aunt," who's of no relation to me. She is the aunt of my late best friend who passed away almost 10 years ago. After my parents passed away, her family "adopted" me and I began celebrating most holidays with them, as if I were a member of the family. I even call her Ant, a butchered but long-time mis-spelling of aunt that is a tradition with the family.

We all pitch in and buy sock presents, because we are all children at heart, and what is Christmas without socks/stockings? Each item for the socks gets wrapped in Sunday color comics newspaper, which makes it fun trying to figure out what everything is while still wrapped. Most years at least one person goes overboard and buys WAY too many sock presents. Can't leave any for next year, NO! Must give them all this year. So the socks are stuffed until they almost burst at the seams, and the leftovers are put into plastic grocery bags that are used to prop up the socks until Christmas morning.

Why am I telling you all this? No idea! I started talking about going shopping tomorrow, and instead of talking about Thanksgiving, I immediately flipped to Christmas! So, back to Thanksgiving talk...my aunt, who's not really my aunt, LOVES turkey dinners, she loves cooking it, she loves eating it, it's one of her favorite meals in the whole world. She loves it so much, she typically keeps at leat three turkeys in her freezer at all times. We also have turkey dinners, full turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes, the whole spiel, twice a year. Once on Thanksgiving and once in the Spring.

Since I'll be with her tomorrow to do some of that Christmas shopping mentioned above, I'm planning on staying there overnight, so I don't have to use more gas to come home, then turn right around the next morning and go right back out there. It will save me 60 miles worth of gas. I still have to figure what I'm going to wear tomorrow and get everything packed. I know what I'm wearing on Thursday...my Dallas Cowboys sweatshirt. I wear it every year, because the other tradition on Thanksgiving, other than turkey and the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade, is FOOTBALL! And Dallas ALWAYS plays on Thanksgiving. Dinner is planned for about 1-2 PM, so we can eat and I can get all the dishes done, or most of them at least, before the game starts, I think about 4:15pM local time. I'm not even sure who they're playing, lol. The game won't be over with until about 7:30, so I'll drive home after that, probably with some leftover turkey. That's about all I let her give to me. The rest I just won't eat. But turkey...that's easily nuked and I can nibble on it all night, lol.

And once Thanksgiving is over, I might consider changing up the colors of my blog to reflect the next holiday on the Calendar, Hannukah! Just kidding. I might change the colors to be more festive for Christmas, or I might look for some background to use. Not sure yet. Don't be too surprised if you see a change one of these days soon.

Yay!!! It took three tries, but I finally got a photo loaded.

This is the shot glass AK sent me after I spent a few hours one evening helping her with Musicmatch. I didn't have a tigger shot glass, so it was a VERY NICE addition to my collection. Thanks AK!

I'm feeling better today. My legs are still a little sore, but my knee isn't bothering me at all. I know, I know...I need to call the doc to have it looked at. Maybe tomorrow, lmao

I stopped at Target on the way home to pick up some new cd's. I got Silverchair (aussie band maree told me about), Alicia Keys new cd As I Am, Trisha Yearwoods new cd Heaven, Heartache and the Power of Love, and George Strait, 22 More Hits, the companion to his 50 Number Ones, includes his new song How 'Bout Them Cowgirls.

Going to be strange only streaming for two hours on Friday nights, lol. Will take a couple weeks to get used to AK streaming between sweetie and myself. But, I believe she's a good addition to The Wolven stream team. I can't wait to hear her stream, it's been a while since I've heard anything but NTT from her, lol.

Well, I was going to post a picture or two tonight, but blogger isn't cooperating. I had a very busy Sunday. I went to my aunt's house to help her paint her dining room and hallway leading to her garage. Since they were last painted a few years ago, her son moved in, moved out, and moved back in again, creating many marks along some of the walls. She got tired of looking at them, and wanted her place to be done before Thanksgiving, so Sunday was P-Day (Painting Day).

I arrived about 9:30am, she fed me breakfast (gooey eggs, sausage, an english muffin and juice), then we got to work. We still had to take her pictures down, move plants and stuff away from one wall by her sliding glass doors, and tape around every doorway. Most of the moving and taping was my job, lol. She did some of the baseboard taping and started edging that part, while I started doing the edging by the ceiling. Then she followed behind me and did the rolling. We work well together, have painted several times together.

We finished about 3:30, sat and rested for a few minutes, then had our late lunch/early dinner of pot roast, carrots and potatoes. We still had to remove all the tape, and put everything back before collapsing exhaausted. I finally left for home about 6:15, and just made it home in time for The Amazing Race.

I woke up this morning, and boy howdy did my legs hurt! I hobbled around all day, my body definitely didn't like all the trips up and down the ladder, and getting up and down onto the floor, lol. But her condo looks MUCH better now. I'm going to go take another couple of Aleve before I head to bed. Hopefully, I'll feel better tomorrow. Oh! That reminds me...I need to pick up some Aleve for Kerry!

Hope everyone has a great week!

The reason I haven't just moved into the 2nd bedroom is because the first bedroom, or master bedroom, has a huge walk in closet. It's so much of a walk in closet, you walk THROUGH it to get to the bathroom! How can I give that up? And...my bedroom furniture, both dresser and bureau have clothes in them. I need those too. There's no room here in the second bedroom for those. And by the time I tried to bring all that into the 2nd bedroom, I could have just switched beds. Much easier! The only thing holding me up now is time, energy, and gumption. When I have one, I don't have the other two, lmao.

Here's a tree that has turned yellow, and started losing it's leaves. Behind it you can see one tree that is red, one that is bare, and a few others that are still green. What a strange autumn we're having.

Here's the tree looking out off my balcony that has turned a beautiful red. It was one of the first trees in back of my building to change, and still seemed like it took longer for it to change this year. I've seen so many variations in coloring this autumn. I've seen bare trees, trees half bare, trees fully colored, trees still changing, and some still green like it's August. I've heard rumors that it's partly due to the lack of rain this fall. Or maybe the warmer temperatures had something to do with it. October sure seemed warmer than usual. I've had maybe four days so far where I've had to scrape frost off my windshield before going to work. Today was the first day below freezing when I went to work.

I stopped and bought two cd's on the way home from work tonight. New cd by Little Big Town, and a new cd by Chris Botti. The Chris Botti is actually for my aunt for Christmas. I had told her about the cd a couple weeks ago, she said she would go buy it. Well, she forgot. So I mentioned it to her a few days ago, she went to Target and couldn't find it. Since I was there tonight, and it was only 11.98, I figured I'd buy it, rip it to my computer, then wrap it for her for Christmas, lmao. Then I told her that on the phone tonight, and she was cool with it. We do stuff like that all the time.

Ok, going to go rip these cd's and finish watching the CMA's.

Here's more pictures of my apartment. I couldn't remember what pictures I showed you before or not. If I repeat any, I apologize.

This is my entertainment center in my living room. Note all the cd's? And there's my second shot glass case on the wall. My first one is in my bedroom right when you walk in the door.

Here's the second bedroom, where my computer is. It's on the right, just off the edge of the picture. That's the new comforter, part of the bed-in-a-bag I bought when I was planning on moving that bed into my bedroom. Alas, I haven't done that yet, and now I'm not sure when the mood will strike me to tear up both bedrooms to do it.

Here's my bedroom. Or at least part of it. You can see my little itty bitty bed. Yup, that's where I sleep every night. There was never a need or a reason for me to get a bigger bed, when I was the only one sleeping in it. Pretty sad indicator of my life, eh?

Here' s the "master" bath, lol. The shower is to the left off the picture. So what you see is what you get.

I'm trying to do this post while the football game is on. Fortunately, the Cowboys are beating the Eagles 28-7 in the 3rd quarter.

I went to see my aunt today. I vaccumed all her floors and she went behind me and mopped them. Then we went out to lunch to Portillo's, a Chicago based hot dog restaurant. I always get a chili dog, no onions, cheese fries and a soda. Yummy!!! (Score is now 35-10, Eagles will have do something miraculous to come back at this point.) AND........I finally got my Bo Bice cd!!! I had my aunt get it when she went to Wal Mart almost 2 weeks ago, but I haven't seen her since, so I finally have it, and can listen to it! Wooooooooo Hoooooooooooooo

After lunch, we went for a Sunday drive. We went to the other side of town to drive past my sister's house (long story). Her eldest daughter was on the front stoop talking to a couple friends, so at least I know they still live there. After that, we drove to another small town on the way back to my aunt's house, and I got to see where her ex-husband is now living. A new grouping of townhomes, very nice area. Then we stopped at a store in Sycamore because they have Diet Coke on sale, 4-12 packs for $10, I got 4 Diet Cherry Coke, mmmmm.

Before starting this post, I looked to see if I have any more pictures to show you, but the only ones left are cloud pictures that I wanted to show in order, so I need to load the first ones on my computer first, or they were pictures of my apartment, but I recall everyone was satisfied with what I showed them already, so I guess you'll have to wait for the cloud pictures.

Back to work tomorrow, so as soon as football is done, I'm off to bed. Have a great week!

While I was packing for my trip to Michigan, we had a storm roll in. It ended up missing us (but caused tornadoes in Lansing, MI), but it provided some awesome cloud formations! There are a few more that took with my film camera that I just picked up a couple days ago. As soon as I can get them on my computer, I'll show you the rest.

Here's a picture, kind of boring though, of some of the leaves beginning to change outside my apartment. There's a tree that has turned a beautiful red that I've taken a picture of. I'll try to get another picture this weekend, if the leaves haven't fallen off yet and the sun is shining. It's interesting to see how different trees change. We have some bare trees, some trees that are half bare, some that are very colorful but haven't lost leaves yet, and some that haven't even changed colors yet. The other thing I've noticed this fall...the beautiful sunsets. I don't remember the last time I've seen so many beautiful sunsets with clouds showing different colors as the sun goes below the horizon.

On OCTOBER 19, my aunt and I went back to Michigan for a long weekend, to visit an old chat friend. The timing was perfect, as the leaves were at their most colorful. Below is a picture I snapped outside an apple orchard. It's just on the outside of Manchester. They had pumpkins, apples (bagged and taffy), donuts, and cider. Many apple orchards offer home-made apples, although I've never learned why. These were AWESOME!

On the way into Manchester, right on the edge of town, there's a yard with a tree, that took what must have been left of a branch and maybe carved an arm and fist into the wood. It's also been painted. This was the best picture I was able to get, Monday morning as we were leaving town. In the fall and winter, the sun isn't at a very good angle to get a nice picture of it. By afternoon, the arm is completely shaded, and a good picture, even with flash, is impossible. It's just something we always look for (along with a llama farm) as we head South on M-52 into Manchester.

We had a very nice visit. We did try to get together with Deb while we were in Michigan, but unfortunately it didn't work out. We've decided that next time we go to Michigan, we will go a day earlier, so we have a whole day to spend with Deb. And perhaps in the Spring, I'll take a day and go visit Deb myself (and maybe meet Kerry there????)

I'll be picking up some pictures I was getting developed (to use up the film I started in August), so I can scan those pictures soon and get some posted in the near future.

***Editors Note: Thanks Styx, for noticing I said November instead of October. No, I didn't go forward in time, I just wasn't paying enough attention to what I was doing when I typed it last night.

Here's a picture I took a couple days ago of the sunset by my apartment. The clouds weren't really that red, they were more pink or mauve. But this is what I got using my digital camera. Pretty cool, huh??

I'm home from my long weekend in Michigan. I had a nice time visiting my friend, but was disappointed in not being able to see another friend. Things just didn't work out like I'd hoped, and I'm not sure what the future will bring.

The colors were beautiful the whole way there, we were told the fall colors are at their peak about now in Michigan, so our timing was perfect. I didn't get the opportunity to get many pictures, we just never seemed to be in a good spot to stop and have me get out to snap a picture. I got one picture while we were at an apple orchard getting cider, apples, donuts, and taffy apples. I'll post that as soon as I get a chance to load the pictures from my camera to my computer.

Right now my knee and back are killing me. I don't know what I did to my back, although it could have been the storage cabinet that I had to push up a flight of stairs on Saturday. Although, my back wasn't bothering me yesterday, only today. My knee though, has been coming on all weekend, the more I went up and down those damn stairs the more it bothered me. I took a couple Aleve earlier, but unless I go elevate it, it won't feel any better. I'll do that when I go watch Journeyman in an hour.

I had a nice weekend, but I'm glad to be home.

Another quiet weekend here. I got caught up on all my tv shows this weekend, and watched two disappointing football games. Oh well. This Friday I will be making another trip to Michigan, to visit a couple friends.

The leaves are finaly starting to turn. Some trees have already changed and the branches are now bare, others are just barely starting to show color. Using the film in my camera that I originaly loaded the end of August for the eclipse, I'm attempting to take several photos over a period of may be a few weeks to show the slow color change here. I think I only have about 4 pictures left on the roll of film, so anything I want to take after that's done will be using my digital camera.

Time to go check the weather for tomorrow so I know how warm I need to dress for work. Have a great week!

So much for trying to support a sports team. Every time I do, they lose. I tried to suppor the Cubs, they were swept in the Divisional Series against Arizona. I tried to support the Cowboys, they are being humiliated by a 1-3 Buffalo team. So I'm back to neutral colors, supporting no team. I give up.

It's late on a Sunday night, I've been watching football all evening, we've had summer-like temperatures all weekend, and I have to work tomorrow, lol.

The Bears just went ahead for the first time, with 2 minutes left. GO BEARS! Tomorrow night is the Cowboys game against Buffalo, so I will be watching that for sure! Another late night for me, lol.

Today, after Kerry's stream, I went out to see my aunt. I haven't seen her for at least a month, as she was sick for a few weeks, and then did too much last Saturday and needed to rest on Sunday. I try to go see her every Sunday, helping her clean her floors (I vaccum, she mops) doing anything else around her condo her son hasn't done, she feeds me, and we go see a movie. Today was no different. We did the floors, ate lunch, went to see The Seeker, I helped her clean her sliding glass doors, I attempted to hook up her new dvd recorder, and I brought in her garden hose for the winter. The only thing I didn't get done was to clean her spare bathtub. She has arthritis in both shoulders, can't bend over to clean the bathtub, and her son won't ever do it. So I do what I can to help.

And the Bears just won the game, intercepting the ball in the endzone as time expires. Wooooooooooo Hoooooooooooooo

So now that the game is over, I can go to bed, lol. Have a great week!

Well, game 1 didn't go as I'd hoped. Cubs lose 3-1. Without reading any articles or watching any post game interviews, I have a few thoughts on the game. Those not interested in baseball can just skip today's post, lol.

1. Carlos Zambrano pitched a GREAT game. He only allowed one run in 6 innings.

2. Since Carlos was pitching well, why bring him out? Confidence in the relievers? Concern for his arm since he'll be pitching again on only 3 days rest?

3. Why is Lou Piniella only going with three starting pitchers for this series? Carlos Zambrano, Rich Hill, and Ted Lilly. It sure puts a lot of pressure on the middle and late relievers to be perfect.

4. All the Cubs, with the exception of Carlos, looked flat last night. Ramirez almost looks like he's not trying when he's at the plate. He's reaching for pitches that he would not normally bother with. Derrick Lee looks like his back is still bothering him. Every time he's at the plate, he's arching back like he's trying to stretch it out. That HAS to be affecting his swing. Soriano, who is typically a first pitch batter, is still being bothered by his sore quad. That affects not just his fielding, but his base running too. In the 6th inning, the Cubs had the bases loaded...THE BASES LOADED, only got ONE run in, and left 3 men on base. They have to be better at advancing the base runners or they'll have no chance tonight or Saturday when they come back to Chicago for game 3.

5. Carlos Marmol pitched the 7th inning in relief of Carlos Zambrano. Marmol had been great, not allowing a run in the last 28 innings he's pitched. What does he do? Gives up two runs to give the D'backs the lead for good.

I really was hoping for more from the Cubs last night. Hopefully they got whatever was bugging them last night out of their system and can come back tonight to tie the series at 1 each.

Go Cubs Go! Go Cubs Go! Hey Chicago, what do you say? Cubs are gonna win today!

Go Cubs Go! Go Cubs Go! Hey Chicago, what do you say? The Cubs are gonna win today!

Game 1 of the National League Division Series between the Chicago Cubs and the Arizona Diamondbacks. The game starts at 9pm CDT, so I will be bleary-eyed tomorrow morning. Carlos "Big Z" Zambrano is pitching for the Cubs tonight, he's pitched better away from home all season, so hopefully he'll continue that trend and give the Cubs a chance to go up 1-0.

I know all you hockey fans and red sox fans and basically non-sports fans could care less about the Cubs, but StygianMuse and I LOVE the Cubs and we'll support them until they win the World Series. And just so everyone knows, it's been 99 years since the Cubs last won the World Series. 99 YEARS!!!

Go Cubbies!!!!!!!!!!