Mixed reviews

I have now been to all three of my classes this semester. The first two should be okay and likely not too much work. The sociology class will likely be the more interesting, but having the advantage of old age and being a news junkie should serve me well in the political science class.
The Business law class, however, is open to debate. I don't think there will be much outside work, BUT the instructor appears to be rather boring and the room we're in right now has Gawd-awful hard chairs that kept me squirming the whole hour we were there tonight. Luckily, we should soon be in our official TTU wing, and the chairs have not been ordered for that area yet, so we must persuade the decorators to get us some nice padded chairs with casters, etc.
The instructor is married to one of Joy's old classmates (age 27) and he is, by my guess, 43-45. He was attending undergrad at LSU in the late 70's and graduated UT law school in '93. So you do the math . . .

Most of my days feel like this...

Mortgage

I've been checking First TN online banking like a mad fool the last few days. I haven't seen our mortgage check cleared despite it being sent many many days ago. I might now (perhaps) know the reason. We received notification that our loan has been sold to USBank from Wachovia. The last date on the letter for Wachovia to receive payments from us is today (8-31), and starting tommorrow payments must be made to USBank. On the notification letter, is says we are required by law 15 days notice before this change takes place. The letter was dated 8-25 and we got it yesterday (8-30). So I'm going to have to do a lot of calling around to see IF the original check is ever going to be applied, or if we must write another check. Since the mortgage is due tomorrow, they better be willing to extend if they don't accept the first payment. Nice of them to sell our mortgage (immediately) before the first payment is due, eh!

Frustration...

Two down, one to go

I have been to the initial meeting of my first two classes,and I don't think either one will be too cumbersome. The Business Law class remains to be seen -- it wouldn't have to be really hard to be informative, but it just depends on how much crap the instructor wants to put us through.
The first class (Sociology in the Business Environment) should be pretty interesting and the time had already been adjusted to 5-8 p.m. The wednesday night class (Political Science 101) should be a breeze. I'm such a news junkie (and old to boot!) that I will probably already be very familiar with lots of the stuff he covers. We only have two tests, too, which might be a problem in some other classes but should not be so here. William Paul Phillips, the DA, is the teacher, and like I figured, he doesn't want to burden us with a lot of outside work.Yeah! It was supposed to meet 6:30-9:30, but he said he likes to go two hours straight through, and be done by 8:30. We can take breaks at our own discretion.
Have I bored all you younger and abler students enough?

Long (Dong - Duck!) description of my weekend

Hope Elana's birthday bash was a success. Somebody should post some pictures. I hope everyone enjoyed the card Danny and I sent! I discovered there is a extension for Firefox that will turn any webpage on/off of Sweedish-chef (Bork Bork) text... so that is funny!

I didn't do much on Saturday. Danny had a Shelby County new band director meeting from 9-12 on Saturday. After he got home we went to Wal-Mart and Target in search of school supplies (and somehow we left without buying any notebook paper). We also cleaned the aquarium... finding not one (which I thought had died anyway) but THREE babies still alive. There were several little corpses found in the old filter, but not sure how many there were to start with. I think we might have 2 females (which sounds weird since they are having babies roughly 5 weeks after we brought them home). However, I read that platies can store sperm for up to 18 months. After that we pretty much sat around on our respective wireless notebooks and messed around on the internet all night.

We went to the 11:00 contemporary service today at Advent Pres. It was different... the music was a rock style (with a country sounding singer who was often very flat) and the sound guy had maximum reverb on the soloists mic (it was AWFUL). The sermon was given by a church member attending seminary at Princeton. It was about being too busy for God, and focused on the sad fact that only one hour is allotted each week to church for most people, and that there is a big rush to get to lunch... so we went over by 30 minutes.

After we got home (and had lunch) I started cleaning the shower in our bathroom and Danny painted the trim in the other bathroom. After cleaning, I did something that I never would have thought of doing (if not for the internet)... I waxed the shower walls. Apparantly cultured marble requires that periodically. It made a big difference, but took a long time. Didn't do the whirlpool tub or the long sinktop, but I guess that will happen down the road some time. We're now sitting here watching Conan (aka ConeBone69 --- you'd have to have seen the intro) on the Emmys. Almost our bedtime, actually.

Tomorrow is my first day of classes. Not sure what is expected of us for tomorrow. I have four classes and two labs -beginning at 8:45 and ending at 5:30. I'm sure I'll be ready for bed before I get home. We got all kinds of expensive books and toys on Friday, but I left most everything in my locker at school. Only brought home my retinoscope(s) because I had to charge the battery(ies) for lab this week. I figure I better let someone tell me how to actually use it before i start shining it in Danny's eyes! :)

To Elana:

Aunt Joy and Uncle Danny

Kids Write the Darndest Things

Danny gave some of his kids an assignment: Create unique sentences for the lines and spaces on the treble and bass clefs. We thought these were worth sharing.

E-G-B-D-F

Every Good Bee Deserves Flowers
Every Girl Buys Designer Fashions
Every Grown Boy Does Fart
Eagles Go Bald During February
Elephants Get Bigger Doing Flips
Even George Buys Dried Fruits

F-A-C-E

Frankie Ate Colored Eggs
Fake Animals Can't Eat
Fat Actors Can Eat
Fabulous Appearances Cause Envy
Fart Anywhere Clean Everywhere (my personal favorite)

G-B-D-F-A

Good Burgers Deserve Fries Always
Good Boys Do Flatulate Anywhere
Great Big Dummies Fail Anytime
Good Boys Don't Fake Anytime
Great Britain Defeats (Defends) France Again


A-C-E-G

All Caterpillers Eat Greens
Any Club Excites Girls
Aunt Cheryl Eats Good
All Cardinals Eat Grubs
Ants Create Elegant Gardens
American Children Eat Gummies
Americans Can Exalt God



What is your favorite?

who'd have thought...

saw this on Joy's blog, so I'd thought I would try it out. Aparently I need to find "that one man" but I just don't see it happening.

Your Aura is Yellow

Your Personality: Life's too short not to have fun. Your bright energy brings joy and laughter to those around you. You in Love: A total flirt, you need a lot of freedom to play. But you'll be loyal to that one man who makes you feel safe. Your Career: You love variety in a job, and you probably won't stick with one career. You would make a great professor, writer, or actress.

What Color Is Your Aura?

I don't like thinking up titles for these things...

Found out today that since I am a GA I have to do a thesis, so the non-thesis path isn't an option. So now I just have to find some project to work on. I am meeting with a professor tomorrow, so hopefully I can get something there. I'm also waiting to hear from a couple of others. Unfotunately, that means it highly unlikely that I will be out of here in May. I really didn't want to be here longer than that, but got to make do with what you can. Hopefully I can get out of here someday.

See Rock City....We Saw Rock City!

Do You See What I See?

What happened?

I tried to make a post a few minutes ago, but it still hasn't shown up on my screen. Where can it be?

And then there were six . . .

Sometime between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. Tuesday, our largest fish decided to swim to that great pond in the sky. We came home to find him lying a few inches from the edge of the pond, already being buzzed by flies. He had apparently taken a great leap of faith and missed, completely. And so we are down to six, all of which are probably eight inches long, maybe more. Or perhaps there was a mutiny, and the others decided it was getting a little too crowded in there for a big fish in a small pond. Hope the others survive -- I'd like to see just how big they will get. These are what, four years old? Or is this their fifth summer? Does anyone remember?

here we go again...

well, i'm a bit disappointed because I have been unable to find a project for a master's thesis. met with a professor today that I had spoken with several weeks ago that mentioned he might have something, but turns out that may not be the case. He did have a project but isn't sure if there is enough substance to it to qualify for a master's thesis. Might be able to work something out, but i'm not putting too much hope into it. It has been much tougher than i thought it would be to find a thesis. It deosn't help that the department seems to be going downhill and moving away from anything aerospace. very limitted amount of professors that even do research that could relate to an AE degree....two of which are retired now. that doesn't help either.

so i'm taking a full load of classes again this semester instead of any research, so it looks to be really busy again. still looking at possible thesis topics to start in the spring, but if I start then I won't be able to get out of here by May as I have been planning. I'll only stay past May if I get some sort of cool project two work on, otherwise I'm just going to say screw it all and do the non-thesis option. That may not be the recommended approach and may not look as good on a resume as a thesis, but it will get me the hell out of here on time. I really don't want to be here any longer than eight years.

that last post went up twice for some reason. The first one had some error so i didn't think it went through, so i posted it a second time. I tried to delete them on the blogger editing page, but they didn't delete from the actual blog. don't know what is up with that unless there is some delay until it deletes from the blogger page. If it does delete and you read this, you won't know what the hell i'm talking about.

Painting...

We've painted the little bathroom (haven't gotten to the trim yet, but have done the ceiling and the walls. Here are some before and after shots:

Yawn ...

Ho Hum, life is rather dull at the Roy household ... football season started tonight, and Paul had to go to SHS for a while at the start of the game ... then came home and started listening to it on the radio ... he still can't quite give it up.

Not much going on. School starts next week, so I spent today getting a lot of my school supplies. I got a new notebook that I thought was really cool. It' s Mead Five-Star wirebound notebook that has fabric covering the wires so they don't get caught on everything. It has several notecards in different sizes in perforated sheets in the front with a couple of storage pockets to store the ones you punch out. It has folder pockets as well, but the best part was that it is half college-ruled paper and the other half is graph paper. It made my inner-nerd smile a little.

When I was leaving my apartment a couple of days ago, I noticed something a little out of place down by the creek. It was some sort of big crane that was perched down there. I walked down and was able to get really close (within about 20 feet) and got a few pictures. It wasn't moving much. The most movement I saw from it was a yawn as I was walking down...everything else was pretty much eye and slight head movement.

I have a birdfeeder that I keep on the ground on my patio so that the squirrels can easily get to it and I (and Sylvester) can see it out the window. The squirrels get pretty agressive and digs out almost all of the seed to get the sunflower seeds, so I plan on getting some that is mostly made of the bigger seeds they like. Well, there had been piles of the seed lying outside the feeder and piled up on the ground....I didn't bother to clean them up any because I knew the birds would eventually get them. I noticed today that several of the seeds have spouted so I now have a nice little green patch on top of all of the ground covering they place around the apartments. Maybe I should spread some more of that around to get more green than brown.

Of course he's guilty...

He has 3 names.

Historical reference

I also don't remember how many years ago that Elvis died, but I do know where I first heard it and what I was doing (sort of like Kennedy being shot??) ... I was visiting your grandfather Roy who was a patient at the Scott County Hospital. He had a small TV on and had heard it on one of the two channels he could receive without cable. At that day and time, TVs were not provided in hospital rooms and you had to bring your own or do without.

So since you're going to be in Memphis for a while, here's something you can serve your visitors (or yourself); a signature drink, if you will.

THE ELVIS

1/2 cup milk
1 frozen banana, sliced
1 tablespoon smooth peanut butter
1 tablespoon honey

In a blender, combine milk, banana, peanut butter and honey and blend until mixture is smooth and frothy. Yield: 1-1/4 cups.

Elvis is dead... get over it!

Today is the anniversary of Elvis's death... what anniversary I couldn't tell you because I don't care. Last Tuesday marked the beginning of Elvis week (not sure what that consists of), ending tonight with a candlelight vigil at Graceland. There is also a documentary being made about Elvis, with the creator interviewing over 250 of Elvis's friends and offering $3 million to anyone who has irrefutible proof that Elvis is still alive (since it is a conspiracy you know). Oh well, I guess I have a few more years of this to look forward to!

In other news, we have a blooming flower in one of our water plants outside. Don't know what it is, but was surprised to see it. Our hostas are also trying to bloom, despite the leaves being brown and crinkly.

Oh... and Danny has a student named El Paso.

I don't know what to do with myself.....

Both kids are at preschool today - Elana until 12:45 and Ethan until 2:15. Weird, weird feeling to be in a quiet house by myself.

Today's Eric's birthday - #32. Having the Sampsels over for the usual dinner and gift-giving festivities. Dottie made it pretty clear this year that she expected ME to host it, so host it I will. Baked Spaghetti and all the trimmings.

Hope you're all well. Better get going and clean house, etc., while I'm temporarily childless.

Joy, did it ever stop raining, or have you floated away by now?

Opportunity lost

Okay, so I set several goals to complete by the time school starts up again. The only one I may meet is to read The DaVinci Code. Started it last night (for about the 5th time) and read about 1/3 of it before heading for bed at midnight. A couple more nights and I will feel like I have accomplished SOMETHING! Then I can brood about not finishing the other things. Just a couple of weeks until classes start, so I'll never accomplish what I wanted to do. So what's new??

IT RAINED

and it is still raining! :)

Woke up about 3:15 to thunder and lightning and a downpour. Hard rain off and on for at least another hour. At 8 am, still raining - however much lighter. Yippee!

In other news, we saw the same fish in the pineapple again! We leave this afternoon bound for the Guard base. Probably won't arrive there until after 11 pm (Eastern). I hope we are allowed to leave earlier that the normal 4-5 pm, or else we won't get back until late... and that's hard on Danny who has to get up by 5am for work.


UPDATE -- Rain stopped just now, so I took the ruler out and measured the water in a bucket outside - 2 full inches. More rain is expected off and on throughout the day.

Rain? Better luck next time... (again)

We had some storms appear in our backyard tonight... pretty severe. All the windows on that side of the house made for a great show. Started with some crazy winds, followed by a few raindrops on the fence (no more after that), and now we are having a strobe light show in our backyard. Took some pics/movies with the digi cam, but the sound was off in the movies. Pretty mad about that since the thunder was so awesome.

Yippee!!!

IT WENT HOME!!!!!!!

Ready, Set, GAG!

Okay, so we had some canned pumpkin about to expire (the big can). I made one pumpkin pie and reserved some to make Pumpkin Ice Cream, per the recipe found in the KitchenAid booklet. Now I noticed something that seemed a bit "off", but decided to go with what the recipe said. Having prepared, frozen, and sampled I can now say "YUCK!" Curious? See for yourself.

Pumpkin Ice Cream

Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups light cream
6 egg yolks
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
****3/4 cup pumpkin pie spice****
1 1/2 cups heavy cream
1 1/2 cups canned solid pack pumpkin


Obviously a misprint, as first thought. Next time I think I'll try 3/4 tsp!
We also used our Penzey's Cake Spice... there went $4 easy!










EXHIBIT A - Note the 3/4 cup pumpkin pie spice as listed in the ingredients.





















EXHIBIT B - Note the lovely coloration provided by the 3/4 cup of spices!







Fortunately for you all there is not an EXHIBIT C!
*You don't want to know*

Red Rob! Red Rob! **spoken w/ index finger in sinister "Shining" voice**

Went to the first wedding involving some of my college friends this weekend. It was a lot of fun and we rented a cabin to spend this last weekend together since many of the group are heading their separate ways since graduating in May. Spend some time down by the dock to go swimming on Sunday and got a pretty bad sunburn....i'm red as hell, but hopefully it won't stay that way too long. Nothing else really going on.

Just finished watching the History Channel story on Oak Ridge (and Los Alamos). It makes history come alive to see those things that are still standing, and even the houses on Beth's street.
Here it is 10 pm and I've just caught my second wind ... just in time to go to bed! No wonder I never get anything done.

Survivors

We have two fish that survived (or caused?) the plague that was our backyard pond. They are both Mickey Mouse Platies, although only one shows the characteristic marking. We spent an awful lot of money to rescue these two $1 fish, so they better live! We bought a 10 gal. tank kit, some gravel (substrate, as it is known by the pros --- crazies!), and some decor (including a pineapple house from Spongebob). Here are some pictures.









One of the fish... see the Mickey Mouse head?












Who lives in a Pineapple under the Sea? Our fish (if they could figure out how to swim into it).

Remember this one?

Found this while going through Ethan's baby photos.

What an attitude :)

Little did we know that it'd be his sister that'd behave this way...

Look ma' I'm blogging

Yes, I have joined the blog. Hooray for me.

Posting...

How do I post to my blog?

Once you've logged into Blogger you'll see your Dashboard, showing your list of blogs. Click the green 'plus' icon to create a new post:

Next, you'll see the Create New Post page. Start by giving your post a Title (optional), then enter the post itself:

When you're done, click the Preview link to make sure it's ready to go:

Once you're satisfied with your post, click the 'Publish' button. This will publish your new post:

Picture Pages...

How do I post pictures?

You can now upload photos using Blogger Images — the image icon in the post editor's toolbar lets you upload images to your blog(s):

When you click this icon, you'll get a window that allows you to select an image or multiple images from your computer. Just click the "Browse" button to locate the ones you want. Alternatively, you can enter the URL of an image that is already online and have it inserted into your post.

If you click on the link for choosing a layout, you can customize the way your images will appear in your post:

The left, center and right options will determine how the text of your post flows around the pictures. This size option lets you scale the pictures to different sizes within this posting area. Note that the picture will still be uploaded in its full size; this option just determines how it is scaled within the content of your post.

Rotavirus Roulette

Hey everyone. Hope all's well with you all. We're still battling the pukes here in Oak Ridge - so far, Ethan's the only one who's escaped unscathed. I went ahead and took him to preschool today - hope he doesn't give the bug to the other kids (or his massively pregnant teacher, who's due Sept. 5) . So far, he's been just fine, so the doc said send him on.

Not much news otherwise. Thanks to Joy for getting this thing rolling. I need to figure out how to post pictures to this thing - you'll all enjoy those much more than my rambling...

Welcome

Welcome to Roys-R-Us. Take some time to familiarize yourself with the layout/functions of the blog... and the post something!