ho hum

Well, I think I am looking for a job... bleh.

A part-time job. That pays really well. With flexible hours. Doing something super cool and interesting. I'm not having much luck. Are you surprised?

I started this blog yesterday, but got stuck filling out a fourteen page job application. Yikes! You'd think they ought to hire me for my dedication and stick-to-it-ive-ness just for completing the darn thing. It's for a part-time clerical job at the Tech school not even some top secret security clearance government undercover gig. Although, for a top secret job you should just give them your name and let them figure out the rest. Here I am in my job search... What a pain in the butt!

I am thinking what I should do is just walk into a couple of little local shops and tell them they need me. No more multi-page applications, custom cover letters, well-written resumes, or hours of searching. Just a handshake and "when can you start?". Those were the days.

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So its a race weekend for us. Joe and I are heading to Spokane this morning and Kate and Jim are staying home. They get to go to the Mariner's game tomorrow while Joe and I hand out papers and schmooze at the track. Think I'd rather go to the baseball game except for a a couple of things. FIRST--the neighbor is fertilizing his fields today and it smells ungodly!!! If you haven't experienced Ferndale's finest cow-crap-nitrogen-dead-fish fertilizer, you're really missing out. It is like a combination of decomposing bodies, 6,000 cows crammed into a closed barn in August, and that nasty pile of Pampers at the bottom of a two-week old garbage can. GAG-O-MATIC!

I will also enjoy the Spokane trip because we are going to stay with my favorite aunt Debbie! It is always a blast to spend time with the James gang :) I'll get some pics of the crew and blog when we get back.

Gotta get movin'. Everyone have an awesome weekend!

weekend off, sorta

I know, I know, my blogging is kind of slipping. But I've been really busy! I mean, it was a holiday weekend and all...
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LANDSCAPING
On Friday we decided to do some landscaping. Mind you, neither Jim nor I are much for the whole landscaping, mowing, weeding, gardening thing. My suggestion was that we hire a couple of guys with names like Juan and Pedro and have them come do the work, but unfortunately (cheap as they may be) Juan and Pedro cost more than I can afford. So we dusted off the shovels and got to work.

Here's the deal, last week when we put in the veggie garden, we uprooted several ugly shrubby things that had been randomly planted in front of the house. There were five lowly bushes in that plot, all kind of standing awkwardly at strange angles, like a corner full of middle schoolers at their first dance. The really tall ones were toward the back, with the short stubby ones huddled in front, and two fat ones standing with their backs to everyone else off to the side. Can you see it?

The poor uprooted shrubs have been laying on my lawn all week, naked roots exposed, with nowhere to go. So we dumped a big pile of dirt out in the corner out front and gave them a home with some structure and permanence. Just what all gawky middle-schooler shrubs need! (Don't ask me where the bizarre shrubs-as-tweenagers analogy came from, it's early and my brain goes strange places sometimes).

Anyway, after dear Jaime (that's Jim in Mexican landscaper talk) and I grumbled at eachother for an hour about how big the pile of dirt should be, where the borders of it should go, which shrubs should go where, and "why the hell didn't you ask me before you started dumping this pile???", we got it laid out and got to work.

After planting the uprooted shrubs, they still looked kind of awkward and lonely, so we wandered around the yard for the next several hours uprooting more unsuspecting foliage and adding it to the newly churned dirt. What started out as a one-hour transplanting project became an all-day landscaping venture. All-in-all it turned out pretty darn good. I don't think we killed anything and a couple of plants might actually bloom soon. I hope so, because I suffer from some serious Rhododendron envy every time I look at my neighbor's yard... I'll show you:
Neighbor's Rhodys

We also put a fence around our little garden, sort of finished cleaning off the patio, cleaned the house, and prepared for a Memorial Day weekend of guests and barbequeing. It was great fun!
Our lump o' dirt project

Jaime's great garden fence

The now useable patio

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TREE PUKE
I know that's gross, but I don't know what else to call it. Do you notice in these pictures that it looks like it has snowed at my house? Well we have this humongous tree in our frontyard that "pukes" these little seedy-pod things all over the neighborhood for a few weeks every spring. Anybody know what it is? The neighbor really wants us to cut it down so her beautiful Rhodys won't be overcome with tree puke, but it is a really cool tree and one of the few we have, so its staying. But it sure is a nuisance. I can't tell if anything is growing in my new little garden because the seedy-pod thingys are covering everything!Baby plants in there somewhere...

Seedy-pod thingys

The culprit

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ONE FINAL NOTE
Sandy brought her new boyfriend, Jeremiah, up to meet us on Saturday. Its serious. Really. I think they're ready to run off to Vegas and just get it over with. I hope they do. I like him very much and its time for her to slow down her crazy life. Sounds like she thinks so too. Don't they look cute and happy? And normal?

Okay, so maybe Jeremiah looks a little drugged-up, but he did just have major surgery on that knee, so he was gonked out on a mixture of Percoset and Vicodin. He had an unfortunate run-in with a tree at Alpental last weekend. Ouch. But he was a trooper, made the trip up here with a car full of kids, tolerated our crazy household, and seamlessly fit into our often-injured family. Welcome to the gang, J!

K, nuff for now. C ya.

blah blah blog

I've got all these little subjects to chat about so I'll post them in no particular order.
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WE GOT A NEW CAR!

We scrapped the new truck idea and decided to get a gas saver. Uck. But it is going to be Katy's car, so she's thrilled. It's a cute little Ford Focus. I feel almost green...ish. I'll never be a tree hugger, recycler, save the earth type, but with gas at $4 bucks a gallon, I'm pretty happy to be getting 30+ mpgs.

Last weekend at the track I was thinking that I'm a little surprised we haven't seen any tree hugger-type protesters at these events. Think about it. 300 RVs drive hundreds of miles at about 6 miles per gallon to get to the race. Once there, we all fire up our generators, burning additional fossil fuels. Then the racers hop on their 100 horsepower fuel-injected motorcycles and proceed to burn $8.00 per gallon race fuel (with additives) all weekend. All the while emitting countless pfc's or whatever into the pristine atmosphere. Sheesh, I can hear the little dinosaurs rollingh around in their graves. Mobil and Chevron should be thanking us and sending gas vouchers our way before every race weekend! Don't even get me started on NASCAR...its just dumb.
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AMERICAN IDOL FINALLY GETS IT RIGHT!

I can't believe my favorite finally won AI :) I haven't watched Idol since the very first season, but I've been a faithful fan since Clay/Ruben. And since Clay/Ruben I have been discouraged every year that the voting public are just a bunch of retards that wouldn't know talent if it walked up and bopped them in the noggin. I mean really, Ruben? Well, this season the voting public came through and the right David won. Woo Hoo, can't wait for his CD!

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WHAT'S WRONG WITH CAPTAIN PHIL?

I hope he's okay. I hope he goes to see a doctor. I hope the Cornelia Marie can finish the season with a billion pounds of crab. I love Phil, gruff old smoking, drinking, swearing, fisherman that he is. Reminds me of my dad. His kids are kinda goobers though. But not as bad as Johnathon's. Glad his demon spawn is off the boat. I have a secret crush on Johnathon and hope to run into him at the Oyster Run someday ;) But wait, then there's Sig...

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OH OH OH, BEFORE I GO! KATY GOT 3RD LAST NIGHT!

She looked so good and focused. No crashing and she actually passed a couple of kids! Here's a pic:

That's it for now, I am gardening and cleaning today. Oh Joy.

BIG NEWS

Joe got his halo off yesterday!!!

Our morning started at 6:30 when we piled into our new car (more on that later) and fought our way through morning traffic to arrive at Children's Hospital at 9am. Who scheduled that, seriously?
On the way, 6:30am

Joe had appointments all day so the various departments and providers could "follow-up" on his amazing progress. I can't even guess how much the day will cost our insurance companies, but I bet it will be a whopper. What with the 3 sets of xrays and the 3-D Cat Scan, and the MRI that they almost took until I said "Whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a tic! He has a shopping cart screwed into his head and you want to put him in a machine that contains a magnet the size of Rhode Island? Are you sure???" The response from the lowly tech was as follows, "Ooops, wrong patient, my bad." Duh.
Cat Scan
X-Rays

Anyway, the super cool (and I am quite sure, amazingly expensive) 3-D Cat Scan apparently told the story, because after a very long day of shuffling back and forth along the miles of hallways in that hospital, hours of waiting, endless consulting and viewing of expensive diagnostic imaging, the "team" all agreed that he was in tip-top shape and could indeed have the cage on his head removed.
Killing time Killing more time

He was so funny when they first disconnected the Halo, his head wobbled around like a bowling ball on a toothpick! They asked him to touch his chin to his chest and when he did he got this beaming smile and said "Awwwww, that feels sooooo gooood". I can't even imagine. They put him into a hard collar exactly like the one the paramedics put on him before strapping him to the backboard after his accident. I'll bet that's another $300 or more for the insurance company, which is really too bad, cuz we have the first collar still tossing around somewhere in the RV. I guess if finances get too much to handle I can start ebaying medical devices...
First freedom
Bobble head

To make a short story long, he's out of the halo and into the collar. He hates it. Its hot. It scritches and rubs and irritates all the wrong places. You have to remember, for the last three months he's had nothing touching his neck, not even clothes, and now its cuddled securely in a padded hard plastic shell. Its bugging the crap out of him. Its supposed to be on for two weeks. I give it two days.
I don't think the medical staff found humor in his T-shirt...

So, the nice part for me is that I no longer have to haul his skinny butt back and forth to school (they wouldn't let him ride the bus in his halo). Every stinkin' day leave the house at 8:45am, home at 9:20ish. Leave again at 1:55pm, home at 2:45 or so. If you're calculating, that gives me approximately 4.5 hours of productivity each day. So if you've been disappointed in the spotty-ness of my blogging, you should see an improvement soon :)

The best part though, is that Joe has made an absolutely miraculous recovery from what was a devastating injury. Really. We were reminded over and over yesterday how lucky he is.

Here's kind of a rundown: He was admitted to Harborview with a C8, ASIA C spinal cord injury (google it). Burst fractures to C6 & C7 from impact with multiple vertebral body fractures due to hyperflexion. Cervical displacement caused a 50% narrowing of his spinal cord, with edema (swelling) impinging the cord another 30%. Keep in mind that 100% cord impairment is total paralysis. He was at 80%. He also had two fractured sinuses, a liver laceration and a pneumothorax. Upon admission he was unable to move or feel his legs, and while he had feeling in his arms, he was not able to use them functionally. He suffered hypersensitivity in his arms and torso, such that any touch (especially the placement of necessary IV's, Oxygen monitors, and blood pressure cuffs) was excruciating. We could not hold his hand for weeks.

19 days later he had medical professionals shaking their heads in awe as he walked completely unassisted out of the rehab department at Children's with a halo on his head. 60 days after that, they cringed as he jumped, skipped and jogged away from his follow-up with a collar on.

He's not 100% perfect, mind you. He is losing hair by the handfuls (it is called telogen effluvium and we're assured it will grow back, but he could end up bald for a while if it doesn't quit soon), he has dulled sensation along his left leg (may never improve), and he cannot extend the fingers or oppose the thumb on his left hand (improving slightly, but could be as good as it gets). Even with the impairments to his hand, the Occupational Therapist was absolutely amazed that he scored average or above on all of the dexterity tests she gave him yesterday. He has found ways to work with what he's got and he's doing a damn fine job of it.
On the way home, 6:30pm

At the very end of our very long day, Joe sat down next to me on the couch. He leaned his head next to mine and snuggled close. It was so wonderful to put my arms around him and feel his little body without it's hard plastic shell and to rest my head against his without the cage in the way...as I kissed him goodnight I didn't let him see the tears in my eyes, but I think he was hiding his from me too.

My baby boy is a miracle and GOD IS GOOD!

work, work, work, busy, busy, busy

I feel like that cubicle guy in the Fed-Ex commercial. Running a million miles an hour, but not really accomplishing anything!!! Paper is publishing tomorrow, website needs updating, garden isn't quite finished, laundry is piling up, and I have to go to my real job at Skagit Powersports today. Anyway, just thought I'd post a quickie to say I've got lots to talk about, but no time to chat.

Tomorrow's the BIG DAY. We leave at about 6am, spend all day at Children's Hospital, and hopefully bring Joe home without a cage on his head. Woo Hoo!

I'll let you know how it goes.

so much to do, so little gumption

Mrs. Parks whined a little bit because I didn't blog yesterday. I was really busy. REALLY. I took pictures in anticipation of blogging about my busy-ness, but I was going to wait until I had befores and afters.

Here's the deal. I'm lazy. I don't like to clean. I don't like to garden. Heck, I don't even like to delete useless obsolete files from my computer--feels too much like work. Therefore, my house is a mess, my yard is a jungle, and my computer runs slower than a 300 lb grandmother on a day-hike to Everest!

I won't say I am ashamed of this side of me, I'm not proud of it, but at (gasp) 40 years-old, I've come to accept it. My dear son Joe is following closely in my footsteps with an acute aversion to work, toil, sweat, homework, and any other activity that feels a little like work. Katy however is a great worker, cheerfully setting about any task assigned to her and usually offering to do whatever it is that Joe is bitching and moaning about. God Bless her. Jim is like that too. At least we have two workers in the family guilting the lazy ones into getting off our butts from time to time.

Anyhooo. Long-suffering husband and I put ourselves to work yesterday in the beautiful sunshine trying to hack our way through the jungle and come up with something remotely resembling 'landscaping'. Neither of us know much about it and neither of us were exactly eager to do it, but we grabbed a couple of shovels, fired up the tractor and got to work. I have sunburned shoulders to prove it. And the promised befores and afters. Here you go...

My vegetable garden:


The stunning entrance to our home:


This is a lovely patio:


And this is the Zen rock garden:


I promised I'd show you afters? Well, everybody is still working...But here's the garden, ready to be planted:


And the hardworking Hollywood Hillbilly on her shiny tractor (you can't see the pink aviator shades that she's sportin', but they're sweet and really add a touch of class to the ensemble!):


So that was Friday. Stay tuned for the results of Saturday and Sunday. Maybe next week I'll actually clean the inside of the house!

Ciao--Enjoy the sunshine.

aaargh

I have realized that I hate selling ads. I used to be good at it, but not anymore. I don't enjoy it and it shows, but I certainly can't afford to hire someone else to do it.

Yesterday I made a huge gaffe by pointing out to advertisers that traffic was way up since the story about the motocrosser who died. Okay, maybe that's insensitive, but it is true. No matter how you look at it, the increased traffic is good for the website and its good for my advertisers.

I guess I am just not supposed to mention that to anyone...because I got a not-nice email and a not-nice phone call about it. I literally felt sick to my stomach, which is very unlike me (being the insensitive type and all) so I immediately sent out an apology, but I'm afraid the damage was done.

As much as I enjoy doing my paper/website I don't know if I can keep it up. I work many, many hours at it and it barely pays for the cost to publish because potential advertisers want to "wait and see" how long NWMX will be around. There are a few who have been regulars and are supporting me and I appreciate them greatly, but its just not enough. If everyone continues to "wait and see" it will be too late. I guess that's what happens to the majority of start-up publications. Its too bad.

So I am brainstorming ways to make money doing what I love--the creative, work from home, website building, blogging, writing, artistic stuff. Here's what I've come up with:

Build websites
Build blog templates
Write freelance
Create advertisements

The only problems is they all require some kind of sales. Selling my products, selling stories, selling myself. Blech! Any ideas???

Maybe I'll write something funny later, I just had to vent for now. Thanks for listening!

my kate

Since I've now blogged the rest of the family I have to do a blog about Kate.

Kate is awesome. Kate is cool. Kate is pretty & popular & smart & talented. She helps around the house, she tolerates her brother. Unlike, Joe she doesn't try to piss us off. I am a lucky, lucky mom to have a teenager like Kate... Let's hope she stays this way. Did I mention she's beautiful?

Beautiful self-portrait (my computer is crammed with pics she has taken of herself!)

Jammin with her new iPod (she's gonna hate me for posting this one)

Looking very sophisticated at her uncle's wedding
Ready for homecoming (that's her boyfriend next to her... Feel free to comment)

sorry honey

So I was showing my hubby Jim the blog and was a tad ashamed that there were no pictures of him on here. Well, other than that tiny speck on the tractor. That could have been Jim Caviezel for all you knew.

Or with my luck, Jim Carrey!

But no, the guy on the tractor is my sweet, hard-working, hard-headed, long-suffering husband, Jim Frank. I love him. The kids love him. Everybody who knows him loves him. Ain't he cute? (He's the one on the right, no, your right).

do over

I renamed my blog, did you notice? "kinda acts of randomness..." Catchy, eh?

I also put a couple of links to it on my website. I'm not really sure if that's a good idea... It means I'll have to try to keep it sort of clean ;) But I figured some of my MX readers might enjoy reading a little more about the day-to-day grind of being me. I can't publish the kind of stuff I write here in my paper, but I guess some of it is entertaining in a more personal way.

My wonderful brother Rob called me last night to compliment me on the story about the boy who died at Washougal and to tell me he clicked thru to the blog, read it, and loved it. So I guess linking works.

Speaking of clicking thru; my website had over 1,200 visitors yesterday! Turns out I am the only one who wrote an eyewitness account and provided some details about the wreck. Motocrossers are a morbid bunch and are never satisfied with information like "he died of internal injuries" or "injuries sustained during a crash" or whatever. They want all the gory details. Well, I didn't really give all the gory details (I do have them, Joe was one of the first people at the scene), but at least I gave enough information to dispel some of the rumors floating around. The only problem is that I am not 100% positive that I got the cause of death correct. I only say that because I didn't actually speak to a medical professional about it. However, based on what Joe saw, what I heard, and what I know happened, I'm 99.9% sure. Hope that's enough.

Okay, I promised before and after photos of Joe Broken. Here you go:

January 2008

At the track January 2008


May 2008


At the track May 2008
I think he looks so much older and of course a bit sickly. He has lost about 25 lbs, his eyes are really sunken in, his skin is bad, AND he's losing hair by the handfuls! (Yes I realize its longer than Jesus', but we've decided it will be easiest to just wait and get it cut once the halo is off). The long hair also covers the couple of bald spots in the back from when he was flat on his back in traction. A little like when it got fuzzy when he was a tiny baby only not nearly so cute. I think the hair loss probably has a lot to do with lack of stimulation to the scalp, its really hard to wash or brush his hair because it pulls on the pin sites and hurts. Then again, it could be because he eats nothing but cup-o-noodles and cereal... Spose I ought to get the kid some vitamins.

He's so cute at the track. Like everybody's cheerleader or maybe some kind of kid-in-a-cage mascot. I am amazed at how upbeat he has been through this whole ordeal. Not once have I heard "poor me" or "why me" or anything like that. He's an amazing kid and my sunshine. I am so lucky. Well, until he gets all ADHD'd out and drives me to drink. Mmmmm cheap white wine is my friend. Or I could just take some of HIS meds and drift away on fluffly pink clouds.

That's it for now. Yak at ya'll later!

Long time no blog, sorry.

Well, it has been a "race weekend" for us. Which means I am worthless as a blogger from about 1pm on Thursday until about 1pm on Monday.


Thursday night Katy raced at Hannegan. She wrecked. A couple of times. Thankfully she didn't hurt anything but her pride. I think she just gets all worked up when its a real race, because when she's practicing at home she really looks great. Watch the action:

It's okay, I was laughing my ass off too :)

Then after she's wrecked a couple of times at the race she kind of settles in and does well...

Whatever. One of these days she'll put it all together. Or in Motocross talk, she'll "get it dialed in".

On Friday after the usual "I don't have the stinkin' keys, I thought YOU had the keys!" and "JOE, don't forget a clean pair of socks!" and all the other crap that goes along with getting on the road, we headed for Washougal. Last week we left the RV there rather than have to fill the damn thing up twice. So our plan was to take the Honda back down this weekend. This being due to the clapped-out nature of the aforementioned Suburban.

Well, here's the deal, we had my sister Sandy's kids for the week AND their large yellow lab and we needed to return them all to Seattle. Are you getting the picture? We loaded my poor little Honda with Me, Jim, Katy, Joe, James, Mailia, our dog Foo, their dog Honey, and a trunk absolutely bulging with crap! Ewww what a ride. If I wasn't choking on flying dog hair I was gagging on stinky feet smell. Thank God we only had to get the kids to the ferry in Seattle. After that the trip was not too bad. I did notice however that my car doesn't get much better gas mileage than the RV when its loaded so full that its belly is dragging on the road turtles. Poor Penelope.

So we had a long racing weekend and are happy not to have another one for a few weeks, cuz it was a doozy. Thankfully we didn't have a rider, because a kid was killed Saturday morning before racing even happened. I would have been freaked out if either of my kids or one of the ones we usually take with us had been racing this weekend. It was very sad. My first thought was "Thank God that isn't my kid" followed closely by "Oh, his poor family". If you want to read about it you can check it out on my website. Let me know how you think I handled the story. Its such a touchy thing...Trying not to offend anyone or say something wrong. Yikes.

Anyway, I am glad the weekend is over and we are all home safe and sound with no extra kids, no extra dogs, and all our little racers healthy and happy. Well, except for Halo Boy, he's still looking a little sickly, but he's doing damn well considering. Which reminds me, I want to do a blog showing joe before and after. You won't believe how much different he looks. Keep an eye out for that one.

Just cuz pictures are fun...

Here's the gang. Do you see 11?

Amazingly we got rid of ONE motorcycle (the little red one to the far right). We didn't actually sell it and get real live money, we traded it to a guy who came out on his excavator to build us a...you guessed it...motocross track.

BTW. Yes, the Anger is on its side. Thanks Kate. We rewarded her by buying her a brand new motorcycle, that's it in our livingroom. Sheesh. You know I blog just to make ya'll feel good about yourselves :)